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“AMY CARR, TIJREE YEARS OLD, SHE’S YOURS.” 

Frontispiece, (see pacje 70.) 

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AMY CARE; 

OR, 

THE FORTUNE-TELLER. 


BY 

J 

CAROLINE CHE^BRO. 



NEW YORK:. 

M. W. DODD, PUBLISHER, 


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606 BROADWAY, ^ 

1864. I'; K 

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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1863, 

By M. W. DODD, 

In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States for 
the Southern District of New York. 




EDWARD O. JENKINS, 
53rinter anh Strreotgper, 
No. 20 Noeth Wiluam St. 



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AMT CARR. 


I. 


<4 TTERB, Amy l” 

J- JL Amy Carr was standing in the kitchen 
door, looking thoughtful, and not happy, when 
she heard this call. At the sound of her name 
she started forward, looked around her, and 
then walked across the long grass to the gate. 

There stood Stephen Rider, with his basket 
on his arm, eager and impatient as usual ; he 
was in a hurry to get to the Station, for Ste- 
phen was a peddler, and sold fruits on the cars, 
as well as at the Station, and along the streets 
of Hamilton. 

“ Kerens one for you, Amy. I picked it out 
on purpose,” he said, as he laid on the gate- 
post the finest peach of the basket. “ Hid you 
ever see such a beauty ? It’s a rare-ripe.” 

Before she had time even to thank him, he 
1* (6) 


6 


AMY CARR. 


was off, running down the street. Amy stood 
looking after him a minute, and then toned 
toward the house again. 

“ I wish I could peddle peaches ! I wish I 
could do anything besides quarrel with Maria, 
she said. “ Ten shillings a day, and sometimes 
more, and that is sixty a week! It’s thirty 
dollars a month he earns. He isn’t as tall as 
I am. No wonder father says little Stephen 
will be a rich man yet. He never seems to be 
tired, though he looks so all the time. It’s be- 
cause he isn’t thinking of himself, but of busi- 
ness. I shouldn’t be tired either, if I had any- 
thing to do that would give me a good start.” 

All at once, Amy’s face brightened ; her 
heart beat faster, and as she stepped into the 
house she looked confident and determined. 

Maria entered the kitchen at the same mo- 
ment with her arms full of ribbon. Amy looked 
at her, and wondered what this might mean. 

Maria wondered too, for she saw the peach 
in Amy’s hand, and such a peach ! where could 
it have come from ! 

“ Where did you get so much ?” she asked. 


AMY CARR. 


7 


“ Stephen gave it to me.” 

“ Well, I wouldn^t want to take a boy’s liv- 
ing out of his hands in that way,” said Maria, 
proudly. 

Amy gave the peach an angry toss through 
the window. 

“That’s all I care for it,” said she. “He 
gave it to me. I was going to tell him that I 
didn’t want it, but” — 

“ Afraid of hurting his feelings, I suppose,” 
said Maria, with a sneer. 

“ I suppose so,” answered Amy. She spoke 
as if she did not care for Maria’s words ; but 
she did care. When she came in just now, she 
was thinking she would give the peach to her, 
and she might carry it to school : but, as usual, 
they had quarreled. 

And Maria, it seemed, was not thinking of 
school ; for already the fingers of the clock 
were close upon figure ix. of the dial, and in a 
minute more the church bell would strike, and 
here was she with her hands full of work, 
thread, needle and thimble ready, and it 
was clear that she intended to sit down there 


8 


AMY CARR. 


in the kitchen, and occupy herself with 
them. 

And now the clock struck — at the same mo- 
ment the church bell began to ring. 

“ There !” said Maria, looking up as if she 
had been waiting for that sound, “ there ! it's 
nine o'clock. You'll be late for one." 

“ When are you going ?" asked Amy. 

“ Not at all," answered Maria. “ Pm going 
to earn my living. I think grandpa’ has kept 
me long enough. So you'll have to go without 
me." 

“ Oh, Maria !" exclaimed Amy. And now 
there was no anger in her face, or in her voice, 
only hope and longing. Why could not she and 
Maria talk like sisters about this ? She came 
nearer as she spoke. “ It’s just what I've been 
thinking," said she. “ I wished I could peddle 
peaches, like Stephen, or do anything. But I 
suppose there's work for girls as well as 
boys.” 

Maria looked at Amy as much surprised as 
if she had supposed that Amy never had a 
thought of earning her own living. 


AMY CARR. 


9 




“ Did you hear us talking last night ?” she 
asked. 

“No. WhoT 

“ Grandpa’ and me.” 

“ No ; I wish I had. I wish you had let me 
talk with you, if it was about doing anything. 
Work, I mean.” . 

Maria looked as if she still doubted whether 
Amy was sincere in saying this, 

“ You didn’t ? You say you didn’t hear us ?” 

“ Not one word. An’t you going to tell me 
what you talked about ? 

Maria was ready. 

“ Grandpa’ was saying how hard the times 
were, and I told him I meant to earn my liv- 
ing. See here. This is a job Mrs. Downing 
gave me. It’s a cape for Hatty. I’ve got all 
these six yards of ribbon to put about this little 
thing! But I’ll get it on, you may depend. 
And what I’m going to do is, get a trade of 
Miss Butler. I’m going to be a milliner. I 
I expect I’ll have a shop of my own, some day. 
But I shall have to go and live with her. And 
if I get any time for my own, it will be Satur- 


10 


AMY CAER. 


day nights and Sundays. And you may think 
how often 111 have Saturday nights, for one of 
the girls told me that often and often they 
worked till 12 o’clock, hurrying to get bonnets 
done for folks to wear o’ Sundays. But they ' 
have all Sundays to rest themselves in, the girls 
do, anyhow.” 

“ Oh, what hard work, Maria I” 

“I don’t care. Besides, what can you ex- 
pect ? If it is hard work, it’s pleasant, and I 
always liked to fuss up pretty things.” 

“ Yes,” said Amy, thoughtfully, “ I know.” 

“ What’ll you do,” asked Maria, “ if you don’t 
keep on at school ?” 

“ Won’t they take me at Miss Butler’s too ?” 

“ Why, you can’t tell green from blue ! And 
you couldn’t see to pick a cherry, if you 
tried.” 

“ I know it.” 

“ You’d make a pretty milliner, then, wouldn’t 
you ?” 

“Besides, what would become of father?” 
asked Amy. 

“ To be sure.” Maria’s voice softened. But 


AMY CARR. 


11 


slie was not quite ready yet to drop the subject 
of Amy’s deficiencies. “ You could never tie a 
knot either, or make a decent bow.” 

“I know it,” replied Amy again. “And 
father needs us more and more, I think.” 

“ He said you must keep on at school.” 

Did heP^ exclaimed Amy, and her eyes 
filled with tears — she looked away. 

“ Yes,” said Maria, growing more and more 
amiable. “You soft little thing, what are you 
crying for ? He said he thought you liked your 
book better than anything else.” 

“ Not better than him, any way,” said Amy, 
with an effort. “ So I’m going to stop. To- 
morrow there’s a new quarter begins. He has 
taken care of me so long, now I must begin to 
think about him! I, as well as you. And 
more than you — for he has always been a father 
to me, Maria.” 

So each of the girls had told her secret 
thought ; and had told it with a gentleness and 
kindness not common in their speech with one 
another. 


12 


AMY CARR. 


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IL 


ELL, now, where are you going V' asked 



t f Maria, for on looking up from her work 
she saw Amy tying her bonnet on. 

“ I won’t be gone long,” answered Amy, and 
she walked quickly out of the kitchen, for she 
was not ready to answer any further questions 
yet. 

She had hardly stepped upon the walk when 
she met a gipsey woman. 

“ Are the young ladies in ?” she asked. “ IVe 
got something good to tell ’em.” 

At that Amy went running back, and called 
to Maria. And there was something in her 
voice that made Maria drop her work. Be- 
sides, she had caught the woman’s last words 
which were spoken with a high shrill voice. 
She was eager to hear the rest. 

“ What’s wanting ?” she asked, as she came 
put into the porch that was so beautifully shaded 


AMY CARR. 


13 


by the noble woodbine, and the overhanging 
willow and elm trees. 

“There’s a pretty lady!” said the gipsey. 
“ Give me your palm a minute and I’ll read you 
the good luck I can see in your eyes.” 

“ Oh, yes, I know all about that,” answered 
Maria. “You want money — that’s what you 
want.” 

The woman’s face looked very grave at that, 
as if she were surprised that any one should 
suspect her sincerity. 

“For a sixpence,” she said, “I’ll tell you 
what’s hidden and secret. And save you from 
an accident and an enemy ; come, now 1” 

“ An accident and an enemy I” exclaimed 
Maria, with spirit. “ Either of ’em might cost 
me a good deal more than sixpence.” And she 
went into the house on a run. 

Presently, back she came, and gave the money 
to the fortune-teller ; exposing her palm at the 
same time, that the old woman might study it. 

“ Get your money 1” said Maria to Amy. 
“ Be quick ! You’ve got to have your fortune 
told, too. You want to know just as much as 
2 


14 


AMY CARR. 


I do. See what your trade is going to be. 
And if you will be rich.” 

“ I haven’t got a sixpence,” said Amy, “ not 
one.” 

“There’s Stephen! call him! Steph!” She 
' herself called, and called in a loud voice, as if 
she were very eager he should hear, in spite of 
what she had said just now. But to accept the 
present of a peach from Stephen was one thing, 
and to borrow money of him was quite another, 
it seemed. 

Stephen came into the yard at the call, and 
Maria said : 

“ Stephen, Amy wants to borrow sixpence of 
you.” 

“No, I don’t either,” said Amy, quickly. 
But she did, and Stephen knew it, saw it in her 
face, and heard it in her voice — and he drew 
from his pocket a dozen sixpences. “ And I’ll 
give you your fortune, too, my brave man,” said 
the gipsey, quickly, when she saw the money. 

“ Will you?” he asked, but he walked back- 
ward a few steps ; then he stood to hear what 
she would foretell for the two girls. 


AMY CARR. 


15 


And first was Marians turn. 

“ Now give me a good one said she, laugh- 
ing ; but at heart she was very much in earnest, 
as eager to hear nothing but good from the 
woman as if those cunning eyes had really 
power to look into the secret future, which God 
alone has in His keeping. 

The fortune-teller whispered in her ear. 
What she promised was riches, ease, and tri- 
umph over an evil enemy, who professed to be 
a friend. She should have a carriage to ride 
in, rings for her fingers, and fine dress a queen 
could not despise. Besides, the accident that 
threatened her should prove to be the greatest 
piece of good luck that could possibly befall 
her ! 

Maria was perfectly satisfied. She could 
not have asked for more. 

She went off smiling, and said to Amy : 

“ Now^s your time. I wish you good luck !” 
She could afford to wish it, such a noble share 
of this world’s goods was laid up in store for 
herself! 

* Amy seemed to hesitate. But the woman 


16 


AMY CARE. 


did not mean to lose that silver sixpenny bit, 
so she took the girFs hand and pretended to 
study it, as she had Maria’s, with a very serious 
face. At last, after a long silence that made 
Amy tremble, her face brightened, as if her 
eyes had pierced through a cloud to the sun, 
and she whispered to Amy. 

“ Pooh ! ” exclaimed she. One might have 
supposed that she did not believe a word the 
woman spoke. But still, though Amy spoke 
with contempt and unbelief, she smiled. 

“ It will be a good time to start out and look 
for work,” said she to Maria. “But if such 
wonderful things are going to happen to us, I 
don’t see the use of bothering about a trade. 
We might just as well sit down and wait.” 

“ That’s what I think, too,” answered Maria. 
But still it was far from her intention to “ sit 
down and wait.” 

“ Come, my fine young gentleman I ” said the 
gipsey to Stephen, in a coaxing voice. “ Now’s 
your turn. Cross my palm with a silver six- 
pence, and then you’ll see what good things 
are in store for you.” 


AMY CARR. 


17 


“No you don’t cried Stephen, laughing, 
and stepping back a pace or two. “ I’m up to 
a trick or two myself. I can draw a crowd 
about me any day. Maybe I’ll teU you your 
fortune, if you are anxious.” 

The woman looked at him as if in doubt 
whether to be angry or no. Then she 
laughed and shook her head scornfully, and 
said : 

“I’ll tell you you can’t do anything with 
a miser. And I’ll tell you, besides, there’s 
them that starves though their purse is never 
empty.” 

“ Miser ! ” repeated Stephen, with contempt. 
“There’s a shilling for you to pay for your 
compliment.” And he tossed the coin at her. 

“ Well, show me your hand ! ” said the 
woman, at the same time stooping to pick up 
the coin. 

“Wait tillT’ve lost my legs and arms, then 
I’ll come and ask you what my fortune’s going 
to be.” And at that Stephen ran whistling out 
of the yard. 

“ Dirty beggar ! ” cried the woman, looking 
2 * 


18 


AMY -CARR. 


angrily after him. But she kept his shilling in 
her hand. 

“"Well, no matter,” said Maria, speaking 
more kindly than her habit was. She felt 
so grateful to the fortune-teller for the good 
things she had foretold I 

“ My dear,” whined the old woman, “ haTO 
you got a crust of bread for a poor, tired 
traveller?” While she spoke, she sat down 
on the step. So, after all, she was only a 
beggar, and a shabby one at that ! 

Maria looked at Amy, but Amy^s back was 
turned. She was already going across the 
grass. Maria called to her ; but Amy said, 
looking around one instant, and not longer, 
“I won’t be long away.” And so when she 
came to the gate she passed through it, and 
went towards the Main street. 

That vexed Maria ; and she was vexed still 
more when she ran into the kitchen and saw 
her work was lying there on the table hardly 
begun. She had lost all this time ! 


AMY CARR. 


19 


III. 


MY, for her part, had been very uneasy 



iA. since Stephen went off in that way, as if 
he despised the fortune-teller. She felt it was 
the very thing she should have done. Stephen 
had set her an example. And, besides, she 
owed him a sixpence, and did not own one in the 
world. That was not a pleasant thought. She 
had before now learned how much easier it is 
to contract a debt than to pay one. 

To show that she believed as little as 
Stephen in this fortune-telling, though she 
really believed more, she walked into the 
street. 

She had, besides, a plan in her mind. It 
had lodged itself there an hour ago, and not 
easily could it be got out again. 

In the basement of the bookstore was a 
room, through whose windows she had often 
looked. 

At a table, in the middle of this room, a 


20 


AMY CARR. 


woman sat at work. Ever since she could 
remember, Amy had seen the woman in tliat 
place at work. It was always the same woman, 
and she was always alone. 

It was Amy’s plan to go into the basement 
and talk with this person. True, the woman 
was a perfect stranger to her ; but Amy had 
looked at her so often that her face did not 
seem strange, and she felt a kind of confidence 
that if she obtained no more than good advice 
here, she should at least get that. 

As she came near the place she walked less 
rapidly. She began to fear and doubt. Still, 
she compelled herself to go on, until she turned 
the corner and went, walking still more slowly, 
down the lane, to the rear of that high building 
where school-books were printed, bound, and 
sold. 

On a platform, in the back-yard, stood a 
wagon, loaded with sacks, that were filled - 
with rags, and these were being weighed. 
The rags were bought here for a paper-mill. 

When Amy saw this wagon she stopped 
short, and wondered how she should get past 


AMY CARR. 


21 


it, or round it. But she did not wonder long. 
Bent on her errand, she made her way into the 
basement, through the dark passage, to the 
room in front. And, behold ! the door was 
locked ! Two or three times she knocked, and 
then she spoke, and called, but there came no 
answer and no sound whatever from within. 

But coming to the street again, she saw a 
woman walking just before her, who, she felt 
very sure, must be the person she had seen at 
work here in this room so long. 

So she followed after her, and in a few mo- 
ments must have overtaken her, had not this 
lady suddenly turned a corner and disappeared 
from her sight. 


22 


AMY CARR. 


IV. 

H urrying on, so fearful that she had now 
lost the track, Amy saw, to her surprise, 
that this lane, as she had supposed it, led imme- 
diately to the rear of the church. 

There she stood, looking down the passage, 
in great dismay, wondering what next to do. 
But while she stood and wondered, a voice said 
to her, 

Won’t you come in with me ?” 

The speaker was a young lady. She was 
dressed in mourning. Her face was very pale, 
and it was also very kind and gentle. ' Sorrow 
had taught her that all mortal beings have a 
right to look to one another for tenderness, 
love, and compassion. Her voice was a voice 
that led our Amy along as a mother’s hand 
might have done. As they entered the chapel 
— for chapel the room was called, and it was 
used for week-day worship by the people who 


AMY CARR. 


23 


gathered on Sundays in the adjoining chnrch — 
the congregation was singing that devout old 
hymn beginning with — 

“ Guide me, O Thou great Jehovah, 

Pilgrim through this barren land.” 

The lady who had become Amy’s guide en- 
tered the first vacant slip, and beckoned this 
little stranger to sit down beside her. Walk- 
ing on tip-toe, afraid that if she breathed 
naturally she might disturb the people, Amy 
obeyed. 

It was not a large company that had gath- 
ered together on this occasion ; but they had 
assembled in the Lord’s name, and it was evi- 
dent that they believed He was, according to 
his promise, in their midst. By and by, while 
the hymn was being sung, Amy had the cour- 
age to look around her. Then she saw not one 
familiar face, but many a kindly one. Young, 
old, and middle-aged were here, and all for 
worship, all for guidance, all for help. “ Pil- 
grims of a barren land,” asking “ bread from 
heaven,” and the “ healing waters.” 

How still, and calm, and safe it seemed in 


24 


AMY CARR. 


that place of prayer ! Amy had fluttered in as 
a leaf might be carried along by the wind, and 
how good it was to be there she felt through 
soul and body. 

The singing ended, and a chapter was then 
read, that wonderful chapter beginning with 
the blessed, comforting words, “ Let not your 
hearts be troubled f the words our Saviour ad- 
dressed to the little company of loving friends 
whose hearts were filled with sorrow and des- 
pair, because He was about to leave them. 

After this chapter, a psalm, the twenty-fifth, 
was read in a low, sweet voice that must surely 
have found its way into every heart : “ Shoiu 
me thy ways^ 0 Lord! teach me thy paths. 
All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth 
unto such as Tceep his covenant and his testi- 
monies,^^ 

Amy thought of the fortune-teller as she list- 
ened, and her face grew red. “ Show me thy 
WAYS, 0 Lord 

This was asking what one^s fortune should 
be in another way than she and Maria had 
asked. It was asking it of Him “in whose 


AMY CARR. 


25 


hand our breath is, and whose are all our ways,'^ 
instead of a miserable beggar who cared more 
for a sixpence, any day, than she ever did for 
truth. 

After the Scripture reading, an old man 
whose hair was white as snow, rose up in his 
place and addressed the young people present. 
He told them of his foolish, simple youth ; of 
his restless, ambitious, toiling manhood ; of the 
warnings God had given him from time to time, 
through his family, and his business, and his 
health ; touching him here and there, trying 
him, as if to show him what manner of man he 
was ; taking away his children, taking, away his 
property, taking away his health ; blessing him 
at unexpected times, and in ways he did not 
look for : and all in vain, until now, in his old 
age, having drank of all the worldly fountains 
and proved that they could never satisfy the 
souFs thirst, he stood up to entreat those who 
were just setting out on the journey of life to 
choose first the kingdom of God and His right- 
eousness, and Tie could testify that all other 
needed things should surely be added to them. 

3 


26 


AMY CARR. 


Then the little company joined in singing the 
hymn, -vYhich the old man, with a broken voice’ 
recited — 

“ Peoi^le of the living God ! 

I have sought the world around : 

Paths of sin and sorrow trod, 

Peace and comfort nowhere found. 

Now to you my spirit turns. 

Turns, a fugitive unblest ; 

Brethren ! where your altar burns, 

Oh receive me into rest. 

“ Lonely I no longer roam. 

Like the cloud, the wind, the wave ; 

Where you dwell shall be my home. 

Where you die shall be my grave ; 

Mine the God whom you adore. 

Your Redeemer shall be mine ; 

Earth can fill my soul no more, 

Every idol I resign.” 

Prayers followed. Prayers for persons in 
danger — ^for persons tempted — for souls that 
seemed to be lost in sin, in wayward folly. 
Prayers for persons in great perplexity. And 
there was one who prayed, prayed at last. 


AMY CARR. 


27 


prayed in secret, drawn into confession of her 
weakness and her sins, who had never prayed 
before. That one was Amy Carr, saying from 
her heart, . , 

“ Show me thy ways, 0 Lord !” 

As she walked out of the chapel with the 
people who had stopped there on the way to 
their places of business to worship God and 
ask his blessing, the lady who had drawn Amy 
in there by her friendly voice, said : 

“ Will you come again to pray with us, my 
child r 

Amy looked up into her face, and answered, 

‘‘ I^d like to. Do you want me 

For she ha!d never felt so happy, or so safe, 
in all her life as now, when she looked on the 
lady’s lovely face, and heard that invitation. 

“ Surely I do. And God wants you ; that is 
better. Come to-morrow, dear.” 

“ Is it every morning ?” 

“ Yes. All the year round.” 

“ ril come.” 

When Amy’s lips closed on that promise it 


28 


AMY CAER. 


was the sincere desire and purpose of her heart 
to come again to-morrow. 

But, as she walked out from the alley to the 
street again, who should she meet but Maria 
Twist I 


AMY CARR. 


29 


V. 

M aria looked twice before she could be- 
lieve that this was actually Amy walking 
with these sober-looking people from the prayer- 
meeting. For she knew what sacred services 
were held in the chapel every morning. 

She had on her arm the cape she had been 
trimming for Mrs. Downing’s little girl. 

“Well, if I ever!” she exclaimed, as Amy 
stopped short, looking not a little bewildered, 
for she knew that Maria would scold, and 
would laugh at her, which was a great deal 
worse. “ That’s what you ran off, and left me 
alone with the fortune-teller for ! keeping me 
from my work ever so long! If you hadn’t 
anything else to do, you might better have 
stayed yourself.” 

“ I had something to do,” said Amy, as con- 
fused, now that she walked by the lady’s side 
no longer, as if being detected coming from a 
3 * 


30 


AMY CARR. 


prayer-meeting were something to be ashamed 
of. Forgetting, that having asked the great 
and mighty Lord to lead her, she had now no 
reason to fear any mortaks ridicule ; ignorant, 
too, that Jesus, who hears every cry for help 
that goes up from the hearts of those who are 
trying to trust his love and his promises, that 
He, on the instant of such prayer, sends his 
Holy Spirit to give help and strength to the 
praying, forgetting all this, she said, “ I had 
something to do. I was hurrying along after a 
woman to ask her about something, some work, 
and she went in there, down the alley to that 
room, or whatever you call it. So I went too. 
But after all I lost sight of her. I should have 
caught up with her, I guess, if you hadn’t come 
along and stopped me I” 

Poor Amy! if she had told the truth, she 
had told it like a coward ! And to think what 
a Helper waited, and would have given her 
victory, if she had only been a little brave, and 
owned how happy she had been in there among 
those worshippers, in “ that room, or whatever 
you call it 1” 


AMY CARR. 


31 


“ Well, what are you going to do now?’^ asked 
Maria, who was thinking too much of what the 
Fortune Teller had told her, to be very cross 
or long angry, this morning. 

“Fm going back to see if I can find that 
woman, where she used to be, or if anybody 
can tell me where she is.” 

So the girls separated on the side- walk. 
They turned their steps in opposite directions, 
just as their hearts were turned. And they 
whose eyes behold our spirits clearly as we look 
upon the persons of each other, saw that this 
day a blessing and a curse was set before these 
young souls ; and tliat One with longing eyes, 
but folded hands, beheld the blessing. Would 
those hands ever unclasp, reach after, and ob- 
tain it ?” 


32 


AMY CARR. 


VI. 


A my was disappointed when she went hack 
to the basement. 

The door was still locked ; the curtains still 
undrawn. She met a boy, however, in the 
back yard, who had come from the printing- 
office with a pail ; he was going to the pump. 
Him she asked about the lady who used to work 
in that room down there. 

“ She’s sick,” was the short answer. 

“ An’t she ever coming back again ?” 

“ I expect so. Of course.” 

“ Where does she live, sir ?” 

“ Don’t know, ma’am.” Having made this 
answer, he ran on with his pail to the pump. 
Amy followed him a step or two, then she stood 
still, doubting what next to do. 

Seeing that she stood there, and looked 
so disappointed, when he came back the boy 


AMY CARR. 


33 


asked “ Why ? What do you want of Miss 

“ I want to ask her something.^ 

“ Well/’ said the boy, moving on again, but 
speaking kindly, “You keep a looking, and 
may be you’ll see her in there afore long. 
I heard she was getting well. Mr. Miles 
couldn’t have waited much longer if she hadn’t 
got better. There’s piles and piles of work 
- to do.” 

These words encouraged Amy. She deter- 
mined she would see Miss Dix the very day 
she came back to the basement. She would 
come every morning to find out whether the 
curtains were yet drawn aside and the door 
unlocked. When the poor woman found how 
much work there was to do, very likely she 
would be glad of help. 

When Amy went home she met Stephen. 
He was loitering near the gate. She wished 
she had not met him. She wished she might not 
see that boy again till she had earned a six- 
pence, and could pay him what she owed. 

“Well,” said he, opening the gate for her, 


34 


AMY CARE. 


“ you’ve got your fortune told. And now 
j^u’re going to take it easy, I expect.” 

“ Why didn’t you have yours told, then ? ” 
asked Amy. 

“ ’Cause I don’t believe in ’em.” 

“No more do I,” said Amy. 

“I can find out my fortune fast enough, 
I guess. I know what I’m going to do. I’ve 
sold two dollars’ worth of chestnuts to-day. 
Clear profit, I mean.” 

“ What are you going to do ? ” asked Amy. 

Stephen was ready to tell her, though he 
did not tell his plans to every one. He thought 
Amy would wish him well. 

“ I’m going to have a fruit-stall, by the Park, 
in a year or two,” said he. “ I’ll have money 
enough ahead to hire one by that time. Then 
I’ll have a shop like the rest of ’em, first you 
know.” 

“I expect you will,” replied Amy. She 
did not smile. “ It sounds true,” she said. 
“ Truer than the old woman’s talk. 

“Yes,” said Stephen, well pleased by her 
confidence. “And I’m going to have it lit 


AMY CARR. 


on 

tjt) 

with gas and all the other fine fixings. Gas 
shows off goods better than oil.’^ 

“ And youdl be having nice new clothes then 
for your mother and yourself, and a good house 
for her to live in, — a great big three-story 
brick building, won’t you ? ” 

“ No, indeed ! but I’ll have a neat, little 
cottage, with a yard and a garden — ^you may 
bet on that.” The boy’s eyes flashed. 

“ Did ever a fortune-teller tell you so ? ” 

“ No ! ” answered Stephen, with scorn. 
“Then how did you ever find it out? I 
know it will come true. But how did you see 
it ? When I try to look ahead I can’t see a 
thing, and I want to.” 

“ When you get to doing something, that’s 
what’ll open your eyes,” said Stephen, encour- 
agingly. 

“I’m going to try to do something pretty 
soon. I’ll pay you that sixpence, Stephen, out 
of my first earnings. I don’t want to ask 
father for it.” 

“ Pooh I ” What’s a sixpence ? ” 

“ I wouldn’t a borrowed it if it hadn’t been 


36 


AMY CARR. 


for Maria. I hate to owe anything. I can’t 
sleep for thinking of it till I get it paid. It’s 
been so often and often.” 

“ What’s that about, Maria ? ” asked a 
voice ; and there stood Maria Twist close 
behind them ! 

For a minute there was no answer. Then 
said Amy : 

“ The fortune-telling, and that sixpence. I’m 
Sony I borrowed it.” 

“ They’ve have been telling her how wicked 
she was, I expect,” said Maria, laughing. “ Amy 
went off and left me here alone with the old 
woman ; and where do you think she went 
to?” 

Stephen looked from one of the girls to the 
other. His face had a very puzzled expres- 
sion. He could not ventimo to guess, 

“ She’s been to a prayer-meeting to get 
her fortune told over again.” 

The boy laughed as if there were something 
very funny in that. 

“ How did you ever get in there ? ” he asked, 
laughing yet. He expected Amy would laugh 


AMY CARR. 


37 


too. When he saw that she was very much 
confused instead, and apparently on the point 
of breaking into tears, he, too, looked grave. 

“ I walked in,’^ said she. 

“ Did you get your fortune told 

“Was you ever in such a place asked 
Amy in turn. 

“ Sometimes.’^ Nobody expected to hear that 
answer from him. 

Amy^s face brightened ; her heart took 
courage ; she looked at Maria. 

“ Well,’^ said she : “ Do they tell fortunes in 
such places ? You know as well as 

“ Sometimes,^^ he said again, speaking in a 
way the girls had not heard him speak before. 
“ I heard mine told in a meeting once.’^ 

They gazed at him with wonder. 

“ What was it ? ” they asked with one 
breath. 

“That’s telling. It’s my secret. But I’m 
going to see if it comes out right. And I know 
it will, beforehand. I guess I’ll go, before you 
get it out of me.” 

“Just tell me one thing,” cried Maria. 

4 


38 


AMY CARR. 


“Who was it told your fortune? You know 
who told ours.” 

“ Well,” said Stephen, who had started off on 
a run — and he stood still just long enough to 
make this answer, and no longer — “ it wasn’t a 
man, and it wasn’t a woman. I’ll tell you, 
girls, that much. Don’t you ask any more.” 

“ It was the Bible,” said Amy to Maria. 

“ You goose !” answered Maria ; “ don’t you 
see he’s fooling you ?” 

But Amy continued saying to herself, 

“ It was the Bible ... I should think it would 
be full of fortune-telling. True, too. Truer 
than the old woman . . . ‘ Show me thy paths, 0 
LordP^^ 


I 


AMY CARR. 


89 


VIL 

QTEPHEN, did you ever really go to the 

kJ prayer-meeting ?” asked Amy, the first 
time she saw the lad again. Her mind was so 
full of the subject, that the question seemed to 
ask itself. 

“ No,^^ he answered j “ what should I be 
there for 1” 

“ Why, I thought,’^ said Amy, so astonished 
at his answer that she hardly knew what to 
say, “I thought you said so. To be 'sure you 
did.’^ 

“ No, I didnT. I never was in such a place. 
I only took your part against Maria. But, 
then, IVe been to preachings, of course, with 
mother. HonT you stop for what Maria says, 
if you want to go. It^s my opinion we donT 
make anything by giving up just because some- 
body says give up.^^ 

“ I mean to go again.” 


40 


AMY CARR. 


“ I hope you^ll hear your fortune told,” said 
he ; and Stephen laughed a pleasant laugh, 
and a kindly expression, really beautiful to see, 
spread over his homely features and his freckled 
face. 

“ It wasn’t for that,” she answered quickly. 
“ I mean to go, because I promised to. I told 
a lady I’d come. And it was real pleasure 
there. Don’t you want to go, Stephen ? I 
should think, if you had your fortune told once, 
and it’s coming out so true, you’d want to go 
again. Perhaps there’s something else you 
ought to know. 

“ Oh, I don’t mind. Folks fortunes are 
pretty much as they choose. You’re going, 
are you, spite of Maria ?” he asked again. 

“ Yes, I am.” 

“ That’s right. I wouldn’t break a promise. 
If I promised you out and out, I’d go, if it cost 
me ever so much. So I an’t agoing to promise. 
They’d think I’d come to peddle fruit, I guess.” 

“ N 0 — they wouldn’t. They’d think you came 
to get a blessing.” 

“ Is that what you’re going for, Amy ?” 


AMY CARR. 


41 


“ It’s what they all go for. Yes.” 

“To get something. Well, now, what if I 
can get all I want outside ?” 

“ You can’t. There’s an old gentleman said 
so. He told how he’d been seeking all his life, 
everywhere, and had found a good many things, 
but there wasn’t anything he found good for 
anything till he found religion.” 

When she had said this, Amy was astonished 
at herself. She had said what was wholly true, 
but not until this moment had she been able to 
take hold of the truth, and look at it, and under- 
stand that it was religion, the Wisdom of the Holy 
Spirit, that she wanted, and that if she found 
that pearl of price in her heart, it was all she 
needed in this life to ask ; for with that wis- 
dom would come the riches of knowledge, yes-! 
durable riches, and peace that passeth under- 
standing. 

“ Did he say so ?” asked Stephen, thought- 
fully. 

“ Yes, Stephen, he did.” You go ask him if 
he didn’t!” 

“Well, now, that would be fun! I expect 
4 ^ 


42 


AMY CARR. 


I’ll go up ^nd down the streets, asking every- 
one I meet for an old gentleman that found 
religion ! Guess I’ll catch him pretty quick.” 

“ There’s one place where you’d find him. I 
know he’s always there.” 

“ If I promised, I’d go,” was Stephen’s an- 
swer. He knew that the place she spoke of 
was the prayer-meeting. 


AMY CARR. 


43 


VIIL 

T he next morning, Amy found abundant 
work to do in the house. Maria kept her 
busy. There was the kitchen to be attended 
to, breakfast to get, and dishes to be washed, 
and an errand down street, besides ; for Maria 
had brought home another piece of sewing 
from Mrs. Downing’s, and Amy, of course, must 
help her through with it. For Maria was earn- 
ing money now, and great was the need of mo- 
ney in that house. 

Never did Amy move so quickly, or work so 
fast, as this morning, and when at last she 
went running through the street in the direc- 
tion of the chapel, she met the people coming 
from the meeting, and heard the town clock 
strike the hour that also told her the time had 
come for the close of morning service. 

Next day the same thing happened ; and the 
next. Amy’s disappointment brought her back 


44 


AMY CARB. 


to the house in no very gentle mood ; and the 
first irritating word Maria spoke brought on a 
storm. 

What was the end of all this hateful talk ? 
Amy was not only ready to say she would never 
go to another morning meeting, but was almost 
ready to deny that she had ever been to one. 

A few days later, Stephen said to Amy : 

“ I didn^t see you out this morning. I looked 
about to see you.” 

She guessed in a moment what he meant ; 
but she said, 

“ Where ?” 

“You know. At that meeting.” 

“ No ; you didn^t. I know that well .enough.” 
But though she had said to herself she would 
never go again, she did not now tell Stephen 
that such was her intention. 

“ Haven^t you ever been but that one time ?” 
asked he. 

“No.” 

“ Why ?” 

“ At first I couldn^t, and then I wouldn^t.” 

“ After you promised ?” 


AMY CARE. 


45 


“ I know it.” 

“ That an^t the way I keep my promises.” 

“ Have you been there, Stephen ?” 

“ Yes.” 

“ You said you couldn^t.” 

“I found I could. I was looking round 
there, and somebody asked me in. So I went.” 

“ What did you think ?” 

“I thought I’d go again. So I did. It 
didn’t take much time.” Out spoke the brave 
boy. No jeer of any person could prevent his 
doing what he thought was right. “ And I’ll 
tell you one thing. I made as much as if I 
hadn’t spent the time. And I’ve seen that old 
gentleman besides. He’s a friend of mine. 
His name is Mr. Spingler.” 

Amy resolved that if she lived till the next 
morning, she would redeem her promise ; would 
find a way of getting to that meeting. The 
resolution that had seemed to die out of her 
was all alive again. It was not easy to keep 
back the tears that started to her eyes as sud- 
denly the pleasant scene of worship came again 
so clear before them. Wretched and lonely 


46 


AMY CARE. 


she had felt in these past days ; it was not true 
that work was all she wanted ; she had never 
worked so much as since that day of the prayer- 
meeting. 

Now my spirit to you turns, 

Turns, a fugitive unblest ! 

Brethren ! where your altar bums, 

Ob, receive me into rest.” 

That was what she wanted. Friends who 
were the Lord’s friends. 

What ! you say. A child ! Amy was four- 
teen years old. How old was Samuel when he 
was called to serve the Lord ? 

But it seemed as if Maria understood what 
Amy’s purpose was when the next morning 
came. 

Never were so many things to do, it appeared, 
as that very morning. And the time for the 
meeting drew near, and work was not finished 
yet. 

At last came Amy with her shawl on her 
arm, and her bonnet on her head, there was 
not another minute to be lost. 

“ Where now ?” asked Maria, looking up from 


AMY CARR. 


47 


her work, speaking very quickly. Her dis- 
pleasure was all ready. 

Amy paused a second,, then the courageous 
answer came, but it was spoken hardly above 
her breath : 

“ I’m going to the prayer-meeting now, Ma- 
ria,” she said. “ I’ll come back and help you 
all day. But now I’m going.” 

“ You an’t ; you’re going to stay and help 
me earn your bread !” exclaimed Maria, angrily, 
starting up. She would have hindered Amy’s go- 
ing in any way she could ; but Amywas gone ! 

I can tell you nothing here that would give 
to you an idea of that delightful morning meet- 
ing. I cannot give God’s sunlight, or the 
blessed flowers to a man who is blind. You 
must yourself come into such an assembly of 
worshippers if you would know what thoughts 
were in Amy’s heart when a voice read, in that 
still place, and all the people sang : 

“ O Jesus, full of truth and gi’ace, 

More full of grace than I of sin. 

Yet once again I seek thy face. 

Open thine arms and take me in ! 




48 


AMY CARR. 


And freely my backslidings beal, 

And love tby faithless servant still !” 

Or, if you would know how her whole soul 
bowed low to Jesus while another read : 

No word in song more sweet tban this ; 

No name is beard more full of bliss : 

No thought brings sweeter comfort nigh ; 
Than Jesus, Son of God most High. 

“ Jesus ! the hope of souls forlorn ! 

How good to them for sin that mourn ! 

To them that seek Thee, O how kind ? 

But what art Thou to them that find. 

“ No tongue of mortals can express, 

No letters write its blessedness : 

Alone who hath Thee in his heart 
Knows, love of Jesus ! what Thou art.” 


AMY CARR. 


49 


IX. 

^ ASTING all your care on Him, for He 

\J careth for you.^^ 

This was the word Amy took with her from 
the blessed place. 

And as she went down the street she said, 
“ Lord, lead me.’^ 

She was making all the haste she might, 
when, passing by the alley that led into the 
rear of the bookstore, she thought of Miss Dix, 
and the next instant she was running down the 
lane. 

She must hurry for Maxda^s sake ; but, if it 
were possible for her to take home good news, 
to say that she also had found employment, 
and should be paid wages for her work, 
would not that sweeten Marians heart a little, 
and obtain for Amy a welcome !” 

And, even as she ran, behold, a hand drew 


50 


AMY CARR. 


aside one of the basement window-curtains, 
and Amy saw a face, a woman’s face, a face 
that was very pale, as if from recent sickness. 
She saw this at a glance, and she ran on the ^ 
faster. 

The door at which she knocked, that told 
het* also that now at last she should have an 
answer to her question. Can you guess how 
her heart beat when she knocked, and a voice 
said, “ Come in,” and she obeyed ? 

Miss Dix had evidently been at work bring- 
ing the room to order, after her long absence. 
She had a broom in her hand, but had only just 
begun to sweep, and there she stood looking 
toward the door. 

When she saw merely a young girl enter, 
a poorly-clad and anxious-looking child, she 
seemed surprised, but she said nothing. She 
stood with her broom in her hand, waiting to 
learn what was wanting. 

Amy must speak. 

“ I came here last week,” she said, “ but the 
door was locked, and I’ve looked every day 
since almost, to see if you hadn’t come.” 


AMY CARR. 


51 


“ What did you want of me asked Miss 

Dix. 

' “ I thought, perhaps, you^d give me some- 
thing to do — some work. Couldn’t I learn to 

do it r 

“I don’t know hut you could, said Miss 
Dix, but her voice did not sound .very encour- 
aging. 

“ Let me sweep the room for you,” said Amy, 
coming nearer ; “ I can sweep clean. You 
have been sick. I’m strong.” 

“ Well, you may, child, thank you.” 

So Miss Dix sat down and waited there at 
the table, doing nothing, while Amy swept the 
floor. 

For, in truth, the effort she had made to 
walk here this morning had tried her very 
much. 

“ I want to do something for a living,” said 
Amy, when the room was swept, and she came 
and stood by the table. She looked so serious, 
and spoke so earnestly, that Miss Dix answered 
as she might have spoken to a person much 
older than Amy. 


52 


AMY CARR. 


“ Tliis looks like easy work, you think. One 
may get a fever doing it, though. That is 
what I got. You can get as tired doing this 
work as breaking stones on the road, if you are 
so foolish as to go beyond your strength. Don’t 
you go to school ?” 

“ I have been ; but I don’t mean to go any 
more. It’s time I was supporting myself. I 
was going to be a teacher, but, since father had 
his hurt, I’ve thought I must be doing something 
for him, and nqt be an expense any longer.” 

The woman looked at Amy as if she would 
read her very heart. After a few miitutes, she 
said, 

“ There’s a good deal of work to do here. 
More than enough for one person. Not enough 
for two women, though. Mr. Miles will em- 
ploy you, if I need an assistant, I dare say. If 
you are handy. And I have no doubt you will 
learn, if you are quite in earnest. But, are 
you to be depended on ? If I employ you, I 
must be sure of you. Do your friends know 
where you are ?” 

“No. I told Maria I should find some work 


AMY CARR. 


53 


as soon as I possibly could. She knows I^m 
looking.^^ 

“Take this sheet of paper, then, and this 
folder. And now watch me. Do exactly as I 
do. Who is Maria 

“ Maria Twist, said Amy, her delight at 
Miss Dix’s kindness greatly disturbed by the 
thought that very likely at this moment Maria 
was angrily wondering why she did not return. 

“And what is your name?” 

“Amy Carr.” 

“Are you and Maria sisters?” 

“No; we live in the same house. I call 
Mr. Herbert father. He^s Marians grandfather, 
though. They adopted me. That was before 
Marians mother came here to live.” 

“ Fold in this way. How long ago might 
that be ?” 

“ Six years. When mother died. Maria's 
grandmother, I mean.” 

“ Oh, then, you have had death in your 
house.” 

“Yes, we have had death ; and a dreadful 
accident. Last year, father — ^he was an engi- 


54 


AMT CARR. 


neer on the railroad — was thrown off the track, 
and had both of his legs broken. One of W 
had to be taken off, and the other isn’t any use 
much. He’s just getting about again in his 
chair. 

“ The railroad people took care of him, but 
it has cost us a great deal beside, his sickness 
has. We couldn’t run to them for everything. 
He wouldn’t allow it, either. He means to go 
to work at something again pretty soon. He 
keeps talking about it all the time. But he 
can’t ever be an engineer again.” 

. Miss Dix was now quite decided — she would 
employ this girl. Even if she should not prove 
to be the kind of assistant she would like best, 
she must employ her. For to her it seemed 
that this was a call no Christian woman would 
dare disregard. 

Amy saw that she had found a friend here, 
and she wanted this friend should know all her 
heart, so by and by said : , 

“ The first time I ever came here to look for 
you I thought , I saw you going up the street, 
and so I followed on till I came to the meeting.” 


AMY CARR. 


55 


“ What meeting ?’^ asked Miss Dix. 

“ In the room behind the church.’^ , 

“ Oh ! . . . You thought you saw me going 
in ! Did you follow me then, — the one you 
thought was me.” 

Wasn’t it you?” 

“ How long since was it, Amy.” 

“ Three weeks to-day.” 

“ No, it wasn’t me. This is the first day I 
have been out for a longer time than that. 
Did you go in ?” 

“ Yes ; a lady asked me in, and I went.” 

“ Did you ever go before ?” 

“ No.” 

“ And haven’t you ever been since ?” 

_ “ Yes. Doi:^ I prpmiseid hej:, I wpuld. ii But 
not till. this njiornin^^^ J couldii^’t. ,I tlio'HgM l 
couldn’t. I don’t, knpvr. . , . j I suppose! '‘i 
wouldn’t.” 

“ And so it was thinking I led the way there 
that took you first into the chapel ! I wish that 
I might lead you into all the pleasant paths of 
righteousness. But there’s a better guide than 
I.” 


56 


AMY CARR. 


Miss Dix smiled as she spoke, and Amy^s 
heart grew warm. 

“ I hoped I should find you there, she said. 

“ And ONE was there you didn’t think of, I 
dare say. Find Him and He will give you all 
you need of friends, and love, and wisdom.” 

Amy listened with all her heart to these and 
other words Miss Dix spoke ; for while this 
woman talked of Jesus, her speech had a won- 
derful, heavenly sound. At the same time she 
was working rapidly, and so skillfully, that 
Miss Dix was satisfied she should find her a 
profitable helpmate. 

-When the bell rang for twelve Miss Dix 
arose from the table, and said, 

“We must talk this business over with your 
friends. If your father is willing, I shall be 
glad to teach you all I know.” 


AMY CARR. 


57 


X. 

S O they went out into the street together. 

They had hardly stepped upon the pavement 
when Amy felt her dress pulled, and looking 
over her shoulder, she saw Stephen Rider 
walking close behind her with an empty basket 
swinging on his arm. 

“See here!” he cried, “Twenty!” and he 
showed her a handful of silver, while at the 
same time he ran on. 

“ He means,” said Amy to Miss Hix, “ that 
he’s made twenty shillings to-day. I’ve wished 
I could peddle fruit, like Stephen, or do any- 
thing. ... He pays his mother’s rent, and 
and pretty nearly supports the famdy. I wish 
I could ever do as much.” 

“ Then do not fear about it. Anybody who 
is in earnest about any good work may hope 
for Grod’s blessing in performing it.” 

“Maria is going to be a milliner’s girl. I 


58 


AMY CARR. 


•was afraid I should have to learn that trade — 
though it’s true what she says, that I can’t tell 
colors. For I didn’t see there was anything 
else I could do. She likes that business, but I 
don’t, I hate it. 

“ It is an honorable occupation, though. I 
know some excellent people who don’t hate it. 
They earn their living in that way.” 

“ But Maria thinks I’m lazy ; and she says I 
don’t want a trade. I’ll show her now.” 

“You don’t say that like a Christian. I 
hope you will show her ... ‘ But if a man 

love not his brother whom he has seen.’ Do 
you remember the rest of it ?” 

Amy did not answer. She did not remember 
it. She felt certain, however, that there was 
reason for her to be ashamed, and she blushed, 
and her eyes fell before the kind and serious 
look ]\Iiss Dix cast upon her. 

“ ‘ How shall he love God whom he has not 
seen?’” continued Miss Dix. “Don’t forget 
the beginning or the end of that verse.” 

Amy made an effort, and a great effort it 
cost her, to reply. 


AMY CARR. 


59 ' 


“ If I should ever go for a milliner, I would 
have to live away from home, and I don’t know 
wdiat would become of father then. I knoAv 
he wants me with him ; he’d miss me. He’s 
been used to me longer than he has to Maria. 
When you see him you’ll understand that I 
must do something — everything for him. 
Won’t you tell him so ?” 

“ Certainly, I will do all I can for you, my 
child.” 

“ Well, this is where we live. Will you tell 
him all about it ?” asked Amy, hurriedly. “ I 
want he should know everything, of course. 
For it seems to me so strange, as if I had been 
led. I don’t feel as if I’d had my own way a 
bit about it. That is father sitting on the 
steps.” 

Amy opened the gate as she spoke, and led 
the way to the front door. 

The door stood open, and Mr. Herbert sat in 
the entry, reading a newspaper. His hair that 
was black once was now beginning to look very 
gray, and his face had many a wrinkle. 

This was the man who had driven the “ iron 


60 


AMY CARR. 


horse” up and down the railroad, thousands 
and thousands of miles. But he would drive 
that horse no more. A look at him told this. 
What cares and trials he had passed through, 
to leave on his face such marks and lines of 
pain ! Such furrows, and such crosses ! 

The solemn face said for him that he saw 
few rays of light in the future years that he 
might yet live through. 

He hardly smiled now, though it was Amy 
who was coming ; smiles were rare in these 
days, on his sad anxious face. 

Miss Dix was the first to speak, and he gave 
her time to tell her errand before he said a 
word. He seemed very much surprised when 
she was through, and looked to Amy for an 
explanation, as if he could hardly believe that 
he had heard aright. 

/ “ Well, sit ye down,” said he. “ LeBs under- 

stand what all this ye’re talking is about. Is 
it some of your getting up, Amy? Are you 
tired of your book ? or is the young lady here 
hard pushed for help ?” 

“ It’s both/’ said Amy. “ Miss Dix wants me 


AMY CARR. 


61 


to help her, and I want to be. helping myself, 
father. I^m old enough to be earning my 
bread.” 

The old man looked at the child thoughtfully 
a few moments, then he turned to Miss Dix, 
and his lips quivered while he said, 

“ I was intending to give this Amy, here, my 
little girl she is” — • he said this so fondly that 
Amy drew nearer to him and laid her hand in 
his, while her look was full of love, “ that’s the 
most I thought of, to give her a good education. 
But there’s been trouble in this house. You 
see what’s happened to me. I’m an old vessel 
wrecked. No use talking. It’s all over with 
me. Never was a man who took more care of 
himself, to keep out of danger than I. For I 
knew, behind my engine, that I was in slippery 
places. But in twenty year there hadn’t been 
a single serious accident on my part of the line. 
We was coming round a curve, ma’am, slow 
and steady, but the minute we touched the 
bridge I saw it go. And this was what was 
saved of me out of it. I don’t know as I’d ever 
lifted my head up after it, if I hadn’t got some- 


62 


AMY CARR. 


thing to show for that break. There was thirty 
men that never moved again after we got down 
into the bed of the river, fur as we could go. 
But, then, no one of ’em all, I take it, would ’a 
cliauged places with me, if they could ’a done 
it. I’m a used up old man. I’ve been liard on 
the girls, they’ve had a hard row, the girls 
have, but it’s kept ’em together, knowing I was 
here.” 

“Father! you an old man! don’t talk so! 
And he won’t be a used-up man, either. Miss 
Di'x, when he gets that cart !” 

“ Yes — ^yes” — said he, in a low voice, “that’s 
what I’ve come to — a cart !” 

He spoke so bitterly, Amy, in spite of her 
hopefulness, felt the great pain of his speech. 

“ Father,” said she, in a very low voice, not 
looking at Miss Dix now, “ father, I’ve been to 
have my fortune told.” 

“Silly girl!” he answered. Then he spoke 
more kindly, “ poor child !” for he thought she 
spoke of the fortune-teller Maria talked so 
much about. And though he had no patience 
with such folly, he had pity for his daughters. 


/ 


A M Y C A E R . 63 

born to so hard a lot. Oh, if all things were 
but in his hands, what easy fortunes would he 
tell, and give them ! 

“ I don’t mean what the gipsey woman said,” 
said Amy, and this time she did look at Miss 
Dix. She hoped that her new friend would 
help her through this story, “ No,” said that 
good woman, “ it isn’t luck that your Amy be- 
lieves in, and hopes in, Mr. Herbert. It’s 
Providence. She believes that God orders all 
things. And she’s glad that He does. She 
is glad that He orders all her goings. And 
she thinks that He led her to me. And she 
feels safe in his heavenly hands.” 

“ Yes, father, that is it I” said Amy, drawing 
yet closer to the poor old man who had covered 
his eyes with his hands while Miss Dix was 
speaking. “ Yes, father, that is it ! You took 
me when there wasn’t anybody else to do it. 
And I believe He gave me to you, and I don’t 
ever mean to leave you. If I go to work in 
Miss Dix’s room I shall be here to get every 
meal for you, and always stay home evenings 
. . . and”— 


64 


AMY CARE. 


She could say no more. Her voice, which 
through all the last-spoken words was very un- 
steady, now failed her altogether. 

On the silence that followed the old man’s 
words came Maria’s voice. She had heard 
Amy speaking, and was looking for her. 

“ That’s the way you keep your promise, is it ? 
Leaving me with all the work. A good deal 
of good it does you to be strolling ojff to prayer- 
meetings in the morning, and gadding about all 
day ! ” 

And, so speaking, Maria came around the 
corner to the front door, and if you had seen 
her then you would have felt sorry for her. 

“ Maria ! ” exclaimed her grandfather, in 
a voice that made her tremble for its severity. 

“Let me explain,” said Miss Dix, hastily. 
“ Come here, Maria, and I’ll tell you all about 
• it.” 

“ Come, Maria,” said Amy. 

“ Come, child,” said Mr. Herbert. 

So Maria came to hear what you have heard 
already. Was she glad do you think? She 
looked more ashamed than satisfied. 


AMY CARR. 


65 


XL 

S O Amy was now fairly at work. 

All day, and every day- of the week, 
except Sunday, she was in the basement, in- 
dustriously at work, and very happy in her 
labor ; dreaming, meanwhile, many a pleasant 
dream of what should be done with her earn- 
ings. A little money buys so many comfortable 
things. People who make no account of six- 
pences have not the least idea of what they 
are worth to poor people who must keep 
account of all changes in the market prices. 

How many various things she was thinking 
she would buy for her father ^s comfort ! Never 
would she tire working for him who had been 
so kind to her. 

How kind he had been to her. And she 
knew it all. All that she could know, for, 
of course, she never could be made to under- 


66 


AMY CAER. 


stand how many anxious cares and thoughts he 
had on her account. And something she must 
never be told. How did it happen that she 
came to be living in his house, as if she had 
been born there, and was his own dear child ? 

Her name was Amy Carr. That was what 
he called her. And there was meaning in the 
name. 

For one dull, cold winter morning, when the 
rain and the snow were contending together so 
furiously, that, for a long time, it was doubtful 
which would carry the day, as the fireman 
was about to leave his engine, the conduc- 
tor called to him from the first car, and 
when he had called, he disappeared within the 
car again. So it was clear he meant that the 
engineer should follow him. Mr. Herbert 
accordingly went back instead of forward, for 
he had just now, as he took the last look at the 
engine, said, “ Forward I March ! to himself, 
and forward ! march I meant home ! 

He was in a hurry to get there, and .no 
y^onder, for he knew what a neat, cheerful, 
comfortable house it was that always . waited 


AMY CARR. 


67 


for him, and that his wife, Amj, would have 
breakfast on the stove, and very likely was 
already looking down the road, expecting 
every moment that he would come in 
sight. 

But the conductor had called him, so, of 
course, there was something wanting ; there- 
fore he went back instead of forward. 

When he opened the car door he saw the ' 
conductor standing half way down the passage, 
looking at one of the seats, and a curious 
expression was on his face, it seemed to be 
a mixture of anger and of pity. 

The fireman walked along, and when he 
came to the conductor’s seat he also looked 
down, and what did he see ? He saw a little 
girl fast asleep — a child, perhaps, three years 
old. 

“That’s a pretty sight to see here such, 
a morning as this,” said the conductor^ speak- 
ing angrily. j: 

“ What on earth does it mean ?” asked the 
fireman. “ Here— alone I ” For it did not 
enter his honest head or heart, to suspect that 




68 


AMY CARR. 


any one could have been so cruel as to abandon 
a little, helpless creature like that. 

“ Mean ! exclaimed the conductor, indig- 
nantly. “It means that somebody has gone 
off and left her ; and what are we going to 
do?” 

Do I ” said the fireman, and he looked at 
the conductor and through the car window. 
“ Good gracious ! won’t anybody be coming 
after her ? On telegraphing or something ?” 

“ I guess likely not,” said the conductor. 
“ I’d know what to do well enough if I was at 
the other end of the line. I’d put her into the 
[Foundling Hospital, and she’d be well taken 
care of in case it turned out she was lost. But 
there isn’t any such snug place here to tuck her 
into. And I don’t know anybody in this place 
I’d ask to take her in. She can’t lie there 
and sleep forever. A good thing for her if 
she could. She’s got to wake up sometime.” 

The fireman stood silent a moment — tears 
rolled down his face. “ I do — I know of a 
place,” said he. “ She’s got to wake up some- 
time, as you say — well. She shall find a good 


AMY CARR. 


69 


roof over her head when she does. So here 
goes!” And as he spoke, he lifted the child, 
and laid her little sleeping head under a fol 
of his shaggy overcoat. 

“Wait,” said the conductor, “here is som ’ 
thing pinned to her back — some writing.” 

“ Eead it.” The engineer’s voice trembled. 

“It says: ^Amy Carr — Three years old — 
Shds yours.' Well, Herbert,” that seems to 
mean you.” 

She's yours.' Does it say that! Then 
they meant to leave her 1” 

“To be sure they did. I never supposed 
anything else. Folks an’t apt to forget their 
children when they’re traveling with them. 
Here’s a satchel, too, under the seat. Her 
things, I suppose.” 

“ Then there won’t be any telegraph, or any* 
thing?” 

“ You may make your mind easy about that.” 

The engineer seemed greatly perplexed, but 
finally he said, 

“ I’ll take her home any way. I can’t leave 
her here. I’ll talk about it with my wife.” 


70 


AMY CARR. 


“ She’ll be good advice,” said the conductor. 

So the engineer trudged home with this bur- 
den in his arms. 

He tried to hide the little, bright pink bun- 
dle with his rough coat-sleeves, but he could not 
quite manage it, for his wife, as she stood and 
watched him as he came, wondered what it 
could be ho was carrying so carefully. For he 
walked along, stooping over, and picking his 
steps, not at all in his usual manner,’ swinging 
his arms, and taking the shortest cut home, no 
matter though it led him over the roughest 
paths. 

When he came to the door of his house it was 
open. There stood his wife waiting for him to 
come in. 

He looked at her. Was she the woman to 
hear such a story as he had to tell ? 

“ See here,” said he. For he did not doubt 
that good and tender heart. “ See what I’ve 
picked up.” And he held up the label on the 
cape before her eyes, so that she could read it. 

And she read, . 

“ Amy Carr. Three years old. She’s yours.” 


AMY CAER. 


71 


■ The woman looked into the little child^s 
fac^ and back again' to her husband . - 
What floe’s this' mean she asked. 

He held up the satchel. ^ 

“ It means/^ said he, “ that somebody left her 
in the cars, and I have brought her here. 
She mustn^t lie there and freeze — sleep herself 
to death, maybe.” 

“ Oh, what a cruel, cruel thing !” said the 
engineer's wife, and she bent her face over the 
little girl, who opened her eyes just then. They 
were the same soft, lovely eyes that looked so 
lovingly on Mr. Herbert at this day. 

Well, they kept the little girl. Nobody ever 
telegraphed for her. Nobody ever came for 
her. Year by year she grew more precious to 
the kind hearts that protected her. 

At first they were always thinking that any 
day some one might come to claim the child. 
This expectation grew to be a fear. For they 
loved Amy so well that they felt that if ever 
they must give her up to any one it would be 
as if death had come into the house. But no 
one ever came for her. 


72 


AMT CARR. 


Death came though. The wife of the engi- 
neer was taken away. What a comfort then 
that Amy was here to ease the sad heart of Mr. 
Herbert, to make his house cheerful, to attend 
to all his wants, to love him and make him feel 
that he had a home yet on earth, and something 
to live for ! 

Maria’s mother died not long after ; then 
Maria came to live in her grandfather’s house ; 
so it was that the two girls were like sisters 
there, though not like very loving sisters. 

But in regard to her early history Amy knew 
no more than that she was the adopted child 
of Mr. Herbert. Herbert said to his wife 
long ago, 

“We will never tell her how she was aban- 
doned. That would be like bringing a black 
frost down on the violets.” 


AMY CARR. 


73 * 


XII. 

M ISS DIX understood very well Amy's de- 
sire and hope. And what her settled pur- 
pose was she knew. More than once tears 
filled her eyes as she’ looked at the sweet, seri- 
ous face of the child. Were they tears of sor- 
row, as she thought of the hard fortune this 
young girl was born to ? Of sorrow that she 
must labor with her own hands for a living ? 
That she was *iiot the heir of wealth and of 
idleness ? That she should not sit and fold her 
hands, and be waited on, and study, or let it 
alone, as is the fortune of a great multitude of 
children ? No ; they were tears of satisfaction 
that slie should have it in her power to encour- 
age and direct this courageous child. And to 
God she prayed that he would guide her and 
take care of her. 

I wonder whether you will understand any- 
thing of the satisfaction Amy felt when Miss 
7 


74 


AMY CARR. 


Dix paid her the wages she had earned, at the 
end of the first week of work in the basement. 

Her first thought now, as she started home, 
with her money in her pocket, was of Stephen 
and the sixpence she owed him. She should 
soon be out of debt. 

As she went down the street she saw him 
standing before a shop window. It was bril- 
liantly lighted with gas, and gaily decorated. 

Stephen was thinking of his shop, that was 
to be, a dozen years from now. On which cor- 
ner of the Park should it be ; what goods he 
should like best to sell, and how they should 
all be arranged. He had nearly settled all 
these matters to his satisfaction, and was about 
to run on again, when Amy came along and 
stopped. 

When he saw it was she he waited of course, 
and said, 

“ I wouldn^t have them oranges pitched into 
a window that way. I’d have a reg’lar pyra- 
mid of the very biggest kind. They’d bring 
doul)le the money they will dumped down in 
that way.” 


AMY CARR. 


75 


“ That would be beautiful/’ said Amy ; she 
seemed to see the lofty red and yellow pyramid 
he had in his mind. Then she remembered 
what it was she had intended to do the first 
time she met him, and she said, “ Oh ! here’s 
your sixpence, Stephen, I hope I won’t ever owe 
you another.” 

“ That’s polite ! ” said he, laughing ; “ I’m 
sure you needn’t be afraid I’d ever ask you 
for it.” 

“ I wasn’t afraid,” said Amy, “ but you know 
I’m earning my living now, and I get a dollar a 
week.” 

“Do well that’s good, anyhow! and 

it’s the right kind of feeling to want to keep 
out of debt. I like that !” 

Stephen spoke quite like a man of business, 
made wise by experience. I dare say you 
would have smiled to hear him saying such 
things — this little ill-clad creature, looking so 
mild, so eager, and so shrewd. But Amy did 
not smile. She thought it was good advice, 
and she meant to act upon it — to keep out of 
debt. 


76 


AMY CARB. 


“ But I don’t want that sixpence,” said he. 
“ You’ve as good as paid for it beforehand, and 
a great deal more. You’ve always been neigh- 
borly to us. Mother thinks so too. I’ve often 
heard her say so. Besides, you know you lost 
your money to begin with ... I wonder if you 
keep thinking over what that old woman told 
you. Don’t you kind o’ hold on to it, what she 
said has got to come to pass ?” 

Amy blushed ; she wished Stephen had not 
asked that question. 

“ Don’t you, now ?” said he, pushing into the 
matter in his way of carrying through whatever 
he attempted to discover. 

“ I wished I could forget it right off, then,” 
said she, “ and I wish I didn’t ever think of it 
now.” 

“ Hail Columbia ! I know what that means !” 
exclaimed Stephen. “You think she’s a liar, 
but for all that you can’t help remembering 
what she said.” 

Amy did not want to hear another word about 
it ; so she went into the grocer’s and* made her 
purchases for the house. The boy went in also, 


AMY CARR. 


77 


and looked about, and finally bought tlie finest 
orange in the window. 

When they came to the gate of Mr. Herbert's 
yard, he said, 

“ Here is a present for your father, Amy,” 
and he perched the orange on the top of the 
bundles she carried. She knew he had bought 
it with the sixpence she paid to him just now. 

What a week’s close was that! What a 
wonderful Saturday evening ! How happy and 
how strong did Amy feel as she sat on her 
mother’s low chair and counted the money she 
had left ! She would have paid it into Mr. 
Herbert’s hands ; that was her intention, and 
she endeavored to do it. But he said, 

“No, no, child. That will never do. You 
must have a savings bank, and lay up your mo- 
ney. That’s the way I began life. Keep track 
of the sixpences, and the shillings will look 
after themselves.” 

Poor Herbert 1 he could not believe it was ac- 
tually true that the hands of these two girls 
were to be the support of his old age ; that the 
money they earned by labor was going to buy 
7 * 


AMY CARR. 


\ 

78 

tlie bread lie ate, and the clothes lie wore, and 
the coal that kept them warm. It was all right, 
he thought, that they should depend on him, 
but all wrong that he should depend on them. 
His, pride rebelled against that, and his love 
rebelled against it ; but neither pride nor love 
could do anything but submit, for the present. 

Maria’s work as a housekeeper was now 
nearly at an end. She had succeeded in mak- 
ing what they all considered a very favorable 
engagement with Miss Butler, a milliner, who 
had a large and fashionable establishment, and 
it was necessary, of course, that she should now 
live away from home. It must come to that, 
though none of them acknowledged it in so 
many words, when they were talking the busi- 
ness over. 

“ To be sure, sir,” said Miss Butler, in reply to 
Mr. Herbert, who was endeavoring to secure 
for his grandchild all the advantages possible, 
in making these arrangements, “Maria shall 
have Sundays for herself. Whenever our work 
admits of it, and that will be almost the year 
round, she shall come home Saturday evening. 


AMY CARR. 


79 


and stay with you till Monday morning. If 
she performs the work expected, after, three 
months have expired I shall pay her wages. I 
have no doubt, judging from what I have seen 
of her, that I shall be pleased with Maria, and 
I hope she will be satisfied with my service.” 

And so Maria went aw*ay from home to live. 

From the quiet lane to the broad street — 
from the little brown cottage under the shade 
of the great elm tree and the willows, to a high 
brick building that had not so much as a green 
shrub or a blade of grass in its neighborhood ; 
from the quiet of home to the bustle of the 
work-room, and the activity of the ^work-shop ; 
from grandfather and Amy to Miss Butler and 
at least twenty girls, whose dress, it seemed to 
Maria, put her own to shame ; from generous 
and tender care of her poor grandfather to a 
place where the chief thing evident was a 
selfish-looking out for one’s own interest. 

If ever a girl had need to pray “ deliver me 
from temptation,” Maria Twist had need when 
she went into Miss Butler’s service. Did she 
so pray ? Why, she felt no fear ! What par- 


80 


•AMY CARR. 


ticular danger was she in, that she'should pray? 
That would have been her question, if any one 
had looked at her with pitying eyes as she 
closed the street door behind her and stood in 
Miss Butler’s shop, on the day when she entered 
the service of the milliner. 

Precisely in her confidence Maria’s danger 
lay. Her temptation was not to rebel against 
the law and order of the shop ; against the au- 
thority exercised over her there ; against the 
duty required of her. No ; but she was living 
now in the midst of silks and ribbons, laces, 
velvets, and “the latest fashions from New 
York and Paris.” 

From morning till night the talk she heard 
was about these things ; the people she saw 
were interested in such matters. Well, and 
where was the wonder? How could it be 
otherwise ? Is not a milliner’s shop the place 
where you buy your bonnet ? and the people 
are not all Quakers, and the fashion of this 
world is a thing that is forever changing, for- 
ever passing away. 

But, then, when Miss Butler fell into the 


AMY CARE. 


81 


habit of calling for Maria as often as a lady 
wished to see a new bonnet on somebody ^s 
head beside her own, that she might criticize 
it and discover its beauties, could Maria help 
remembering what the fortune-teller said, 
that her face would make her fortune, by and 
by? 

So what do you think about it ? Was Maria 
in a fair way to fight a good fight, in the midst 
of this exhibition of costly and dainty articles 
of dress, herself often placed on exhibition for 
the benefit of the idle and fashionable women 
who strolled into Miss Butler^s shop-room every 
fine morning to chat away an hour they knew 
not what else to do with ? 

Do you think there’s no particular need for 
her to use the prayer our Jesus taught his poor 
foolish earth-born friends ? Did he not know 
our need? Did he not look forward from 
Galilee to America, and see the girls here, like 
Maria, who would need sometime to know that 
if they uttered that cry, the Father would 
surely hear them and send his deliverance, and 
encompass them with protection ? 


82 


AMY CARR. 


But Maria ! she is in no danger ! slie is abun- 
dantly able to take care of herself ! 

And she is not going to make a fright of 
herself, she says, reflecting on the figure she 
must present to the eyes of people, by wearing 
any longer those old-fashioned rags of hers : 
all the other girls are “respectably^^ clad ; 
they dress in good taste ; their clothes look as 
if they were made for tliem^ and not for their 
grandmothers ! 

Maria liked the shop. That is not quite the 
same as saying that she liked her work. But 
she did also like the employment she found 
there. ^ 

She liked the colors and the textures of the 
stuffs she handled. She liked the flood of gas- 
light that poured into the rooms by night — 
what a contrast, those bright rooms, to the 
dark shadows in the corners of tlie kitchen at 
home, where one little lamp was burning ! She 
liked the gossip she heard ; liked to be rid of 
the pain of seeing an old man sitting helpless 
from morning till night in the house. 

And should we not be glad that Maria’s oc- 


AMY CARR. 


83 


cupation was precisely such as her fingers were 
designed for? Yerily, yes! There are so 
many kinds of honorable work to be done in 
this busy world, it seems indeed a pity that ever 
a pair of hands or an intelligent brain should 
be occupied with that wliich is a painful, or a 
troublesome, or a joyless task. No one is born 
to idleness — and how shall the workers sing on 
through their labor, and so keep time with the 
singing spheres, unless their hands have found 
to do th^ very work that nature intended ? 

Maria took to her work, as people said, quite 
naturally. She did not desire any other. And 
we should rejoice with her, as with all who 
find work easy, pleasant, and honorable ; who 
are satisfied with their , business, and feel sure 
it was given them to do. 

Ah, yes I if Maria had not felt so very safe^ 
as well as so content ; if she had only under- 
stood that nowhere on this earth is a young 
girl safe who feels that she can take care of 
herself without troubling Him who is away off 
in his Heaven, taking care of his universe, and 
not thinking at all of her ! 


84 


AMY CARR. 


If slie had only believed so that she must 
live by the belief, that God was himself her 
helper, her shield, her staff, her light, and her 
Redeemer, then, indeed, she and we might talk 
about her safety, and say that her courage was 
noble, and never fear for the duration of her 
content. No matter what her employment, if 
it was honorable, and she was fitted to it ; no 
matter where her path lay ; Maria would then 
* have been safe. 

Because^ where tlie angdoftlie Lord encam'ps, 
is safety. 

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the 
shadoio of death, yet loill I fear tio evil ; for, 
Thou art with me. 

Because he hath set his love upon me, there- 
fore iviU I deliver him. 

But what are even shields of gold, and strong 
arms of human love, if they are the only de- 
fences the soul seeks for itself? 

Look where the self-confident mortal goes 
his way rejoicing ; if 5"ou turn to see it stum- 
bling, ere long, you will not look in vain. If 
you listen to hear it complain of the darkness, 


AMY CARR. 


85 


you will not listen in vain. Alas, when we 
shut God out of this world, and walk on in it 
alone, so proud, so vain, so sure we understand 
all the ways, and are above all the needs, do we 
really not know that we have shut out all the 
blessedness, the glory, and the beauty, and have 
only kept the sorrow and care, the pain and 
death, the anguish and the curse ? 

Why, only think of it ! there was room for 
God there in Miss Butler’s shop ! 

Is there room for Thee, oh, thou blessed one, 
who hast said, “ If any man loill opm to me, I 
loill come in and sup with him, and he with me,” 
and shall we shut Thee out of our place of 
habitation, our work-shop, or our show-room ? 
Then surely we may go learn hospitality of the 
wild men of the desert and the forest. 

Solomon, who had not seen the son of Mary, 
— no wonder that he scarcely dared invite the 
great Jehovah to “ dwell with men” in the tem- 
ple he had built ; but the Holy One has asked 
our invitation — He will come whenever we call. 
Yes-I Jehovah has come down even to our low 
estate, and given to us Jesus, for whom we 
8 


86 


AMY CARR. 


must find room. Oh, no longer let Him say we 
gave to Him no kiss, and that He has not where 
to lay his head! 

But Maria was not troubled by such a thought 
as this of Ring Solomon^s. She was not dis- 
turbed with the consideration that this place 
was not good enough for Him to rest in. She 
loanted Him not! To carry her conscience 
about with her everywhere, as Amy seemed to 
do, what a nuisance that would be ! She be- 
lieved herself to be well off, indeed, and safe, 
as good as the rest, and why should she set 
herself up for a saint, or bother herself for- 
ever with thinking about her “ duty ?’ ’ 

Poor Maria — so endangered, walking among 
quicksands — she never said “ Lord, deliver me 
She could take care of herself I She was earn- 
ing her own living I 

Surrounded by allurements, never once she 
cried, “ Lead me not into temptation.’’ 

Still, when she put on her new bonnet and 
cape, not long after her work began in Miss 
Butler’s shop, and appeared in them on Sunday 
morning before Amy and her grandfather, she 


AMY CARR. 


87 


felt a little anxious, wondering wliat Amy 
would think. For Amy, of course, would never 
understand that a girl who worked at such a 
trade as a milliner’s could not go about dressed 
like a nun.” 

What did Amy think ? She said, 

“ Why, Maria, how fine you are I I never 
should have known you.” 

It pleased Maria to hear Amy saying that, 
for though Amy looked astonished, there was 
no reproof in her voice, or her eyes, on account 
of Maria’s extravagance ; and that was what 
Maria expected to encounter, and for it she had 
prepared herself. 

“ How do you like the rig ?” said she. “ I 
had to get it, you know.” 

“You look like a lady,” said Amy. “I 
didn’t think you would look like that.” 

“ Why not ?” asked Maria, not very well 
pleased by that remark. 

“Well, I mean you never looked so nice 
before. What a lovely bonnet ! said 
Amy. 

“ If you want to look like a lady, all you’ve 


88 


AMY CARR. 


got to do is to dress yourself decently/^ ex- 
plained Maria. 

“ And act like one, and he one,’^ said Amy. 

“ Of course ; everybody knows that. It 
sounds as if you had read it out of a spelling- 
book. You must have a bonnet like mine, 
Amy. Your old one is a perfect fright. I 
don^t suppose you have the least idea how it 
looks. You wouldn’t look like the same person 
in a bonnet like mine. You must just treat 
yourself to one.” 

“ I ! no, indeed, I mustn’t,” answered Amy. 
She seemed quite terrified at the mere thought 
of such a thing. “ The old one is good enough. 
Anyway, I don’t lose much time getting through 
the streets, and I don’t believe anybody ever 
knows what I have on.” 

“Well, now, you don’t believe any such thing! 
They see even Stephen Rider. I heard the 
girls laughing about him the other day ; and 
you are a head taller than Stephen ; so your 
bonnet can’t help being seen.” 

Maria laughed, but she was very much in 
earnest, saying this. 


AMY CAEE. 


89 


“ I can^t get a bonnet yet,” said Amy. 

“Well, I wasn’t going to order it to-night ; 
but you must do it pretty quick, I warn you, 
or when you go to look for your old one, you 
won’t find it. Somebody will burn it up by 
mistake. Here’^a bonnet- ribbon I brought for 
you. How do you like it ?” 

“ You haven’t brought this for me !” exclaim- 
ed Amy, unrolling the ribbon ; it was a pretty 
blue, with a vine along the edges. Maria had 
bought Amy this present to smooth the way. 
for her own conscience. 

“ Of course it’s for you,” said Maria ; “ there 
isn’t anything so very surprising about that, 
is there? I hope you know how to take a 
present.” 

“A present! no, that mustn’t be,” said 
Amy. 

“ Bring your bonnet, anyway, for I am in a 
hurry ; let’s see what can be done with it.” 

So Amy brought the old straw bonnet and 
stood by while Maria cut off the worn and 
faded ribbons, and ordered them into the stove. 
She was in excellent spirits and made Amy 
8 * 


90 


AMY CARE. 


laugli, while she went on rapidly with her work 
of trimming. 

“ Now tell me ; do you ever go to meeting 
in these days asked she, when she had nearly 
done. 

“ Sometimes,'^ Amy said. 

“ Well, won’t you feel better ; confess ! with 
a respectable bonnet on your head? Folks 
must have thought the highway and hedges 
had turned in when they saw you and Ste- 
.phen.” 

“I don’t care what they think. They al- 
ways treat me kindly. And Miss Dix don’t 
seem to be ashamed of me.” 

“ Don’t be spunky. That won’t do, you know. 
It isn’t lady-like ; and besides, it isn’t Chris- 
tian.” 

“Well, what makes you say such things? 
Do you ever go to the meeting, Maria ?” 

“ 1 1 what does the child think a girl is at 
Miss Butler’s for ? why, from morning till night 
I never have a moment that’s my own. Miss 
Butler can’t help it though, and I don’t com- 
plain. I like to be in a hurry ; but, you know. 


AMY CARR. 


91 


anyway, those meetings are a dull kind of 
amusement, I think.’’ 

“ Amusement I” 

“ Yes, amusement ; you know you go for the 
singing. I expect you’ll be a full choir, or a 
band, one of these days. I’ll come to the meet- 
ing-house when that happens. But at present 
we have to sit in Miss Butler’s pew, you know, 
on Sunday, if we go to church at all. At least 
the girls say that’s what she wants ; but I can 
stay with grandfather. I like to go though 
well enough. How is grandfather getting on 
without us, do you think ?” 

“ Oh, Maria, pretty well, I guess, but how 
lonesome he must be. Still the neighbors are 
very kind. And that’s what I wanted to tell 
you, but you put it out of my head. There’s 
an old gentleman — I heard him one day speak- 
ing — it was in the meeting, Maria, but you must 
like him for all that. Stephen brought him 
here to see father yesterday, and he’s coming 
often, he says ; he hasn’t any work to do. He’s 
a gentleman, and so kind. Father liked him, 
too. His name is Mr. Spingler.” 


92 


AMY CARR. 


“ Well, tliat^s the best thing IVe heard in a 
week,” said Maria, and she really did look glad ; 
“ there’s your bonnet. Now let’s go hear what 
grandfather has to tell about the gentleman. 
And when I say I must go, Amy, don’t you try 
to koep me ; it might plague him, and I really 
haven’t but a minute or two more.” 

“ But, Maria, in the first place, I thank you 
so much ; but I’m so sorry that you got that 
ribbon.” 

“You must try to reconcile yourself to it, 
for what’s done can’t be helped, you know,” 
said Maria, “folks won’t think the worse of 
you for looking respectable. Come, I’m losing 
time.” 


AMY CARR. 


93 


xm. 

W HEN the girls used to talk with Mr. Her- 
bert about the cart, he did not take it very 
pleasantly. You remember what he said about 
it the day Miss Dix came home with Amy to 
talk with him about Amy’s future. And of 
course his feeling could not be wondered at. 
A man who has driven the iron horse which 
has a spirit of fire, for years and years, does not 
find the prospect of wheeling himself about 
over pavements, and sitting» at street corners, 
the vender of small wares, fruits, newspapers, 
and so forth, very agreeable. 

It offended Mr. Herbert to think of himself 
as an object of compassion, exposed to public 
observation. How many times should he be 
obliged to tell the story of his misfortunes to 
curious people, who would say “ what a pity !” 
and go their ways just as if they had read a 
paragraph in a newspaper, that reported some 


u 


AMY CARR. 


accident by which a man had lost his legs, 
straightway forgetting, while hs could never 
forget I 

Besides, what if he succeeded in selling his 
wares ? After all, what a difference between 
this and the regular way of trade ! The people 
who bought of him, and he who sold, would feel 
that it was charity. And to think of coming 
to that I It was a bitter reflection. No won- 
der he shrank from it. But what could he do ? 

Now that the girls were fairly at work, both 
of them, under Miss Butler and Miss Dix, this 
question was forever coming back to him, and 
he must answer it. 

He said to himself one day, when he was 
alone in the house : 

“Old Herbert, what is the reason? You 
are well enough now to be at some kind of 
work. Why don’t you set about it? Are you 
going to sit here forever till you get to be as 
weak as a woman in your heart? Weak as a 
woman ! Wife, I’ll take that back. I never 
saw you weak in anything but wickedness and 
hard-heartedness. You weren’t strong enough 


AMY CARR. 


95 


for that. And there are those girls, little as 
they are, they’re strong enough for work. ' So 
am I !” 

That brought him back to the question : 

“ What will you do ?” 

And he remembered the cart. 

Mr. Herbert had been a strong man in his 
day, but a cold shiver crept over his frame, 
succeeded by a hot flash, when that cart seemed 
to wheel itself up before his eyes, and stop 
short, as if waiting for him to get in. Was it 
going to prove itself a very Juggernaut car for 
crushing his pride out of him ? His pride ! 
What was he, to entertain so extravagant a 
guest? 

It was curious that Mr. Spingler had got to 
talking on this very subject in one of his late 
visits, for he was now a frequent visitor, and a 
very friendly one. 

Had Stephen put it into that man’s head ? 

For Mr. Spingler said, 

“ Mr. Herbert, I don’t like to think of you 
shut up here in this way, sir. You must get 
out ; you must live in the open air, as you have 




96 


AMY CARR. 


been in the habit of living. It’s the sunlight 
^ you want.” 

When he said that, Mr, Herbert an- 
swered : 

“The sun has set, sir, and the twilight is 
about over.” 

“ That’s just your mistake. I know it !” said 
the hale and cheery old gentleman, wiping his 
eyes as he spoke. “ You’ve set in here in the 
shade so long, no wonder you’ve lost your reck- 
oning, and mistake the time of day. It isn’t 
but a little past noon with you. Perhaps, sir — 
I shouldn’t wonder at anything — my house is 
down there on a corner of the Park — I expect 
and hope you’ll come down and spend part of 
your evening with me ! Don’t you see how 
easy it would be to keep a shop down there, if 
you could only persuade yourself that you’ve 
got all the afternoon for resting in ?” 

These words, and others like them, had acted 
on Mr. Herbert like a tonic. He had not re- 
peated them, but he thought of them over and 
over. What if the afternoon and the evening 
of his life should be warmed indeed by the set- 


AMY CARR. 97 

ting sun and cheerful company and steady oc- 
cupation ? 

He was thinking of these things when Stephen 
Rider came into the house, as he came every 
day at noon to inquire if anything was wanting, 
in the absence of Amy. Stephen was always 
in a hurry ; he seemed to live on a run. 

When Mr. Herbert saw him standing there 
so full of life, where, just now, he seemed to see 
the cart, he was amazed — seemed to be waking 
from a dream — and he envied the lad. 

“ Here’s a newspaper,” said Stephen. “ Mr. 
Spingler sent it to you. A new one, I guess. 
How do you find yourself, sir ? Is there any- 
thing you’ll have ? ” 

“ Yes ; a pair of legs ! ” There it was, 
abruptly spoken — right out of the poor man’s 
heart — the constant wish, that was a helpless 
wish, for it never could be granted. 

A shadow seemed to fall over Stephen’s face 
at these words. I’d work my arms off to get 
’em for you, if that would do it,” said he. 

“ I ought to know better than to sit here wish- 
ing at my time of day. A child couldn’t be 
9 


98 


AMY CAER. 


more silly/’ said Mr. Herbert, ashamed to think 
how in spite of his resolutions he had come 
straight back to his old tiresome reflections. 

“Then,” said Stephen, “ you ought to be in the 
street.” 

“That’s what Mr. Spingler says, and it’s 
easy enough said, too,” was Mr. Herbert’s 
answer. 

“ Everybody says it,” said Stephen. His face 
brightened when Herbert mentioned Mr. Sping- 
ler, as if he felt that the point was now as good 
as carried, since the old gentleman had taken 
the business up. “ If you should get out into 
the street, and down as far as the Park once 
(Mr. Spingler lives down there), it would be a 
reg’lar good thing,” said he. “ You’d have 
some fresh things to think about. W e could get 
you down there early in the morning, the same 
time Amy started to her work, and leave the 
old house here to take care of itself — mother 
would mind the fires — and then you and Amy 
could come back together at night, and I’d be 
around to help ; and what jolly evenings you’d 
liave here after it was all over ! ... That 


AMY CARR. 


99 


thing would roll right into the house, you 
know.” 

“ That thing ” was the cart, as Mr. Herbert 
very well understood. And he knew why 
Stephen hesitated about naming it to him. 

“ You think that Ihn worse than an old rag- 
doll, Stephen,” said he, “ or you wouldn^t be 
afraid to say cart to me right out.” 

“ Cart ! ” said Stephen, laughing. “ Who’s , 
afraid? Now, Mr. Herbert, let me wheel it 
round for you, and have it here all ready for 
Amy to look at when she gets home to-night.” 

“ I wish you would,” said the engineer. 
Stephen did not wait to hear that permission 
repeated. 

And so, when Amy came home in the after- 
noon, there, in the kitchen, stood the cart ! 

“ My engine,” said Mr. Herbert, when she 
stood and looked at it, and could not speak for 
amazement and gladness. “ You and Stephen 
must help me get the steam up, and keep me 
on the track. And shall I have to carry a 
bell along for warning, in case there is any 
danger of a collision ? ” 


100 


AMY CARR. 


Amy laughed at that question as if she did 
not hear in it a groan. But she did hear it, 
and her heart responded to it. Still she 
answered cheerily, and he never suspected 
her prayer, “ God help him ! ” 

“There’ll never be any danger of a colli- 
sion,” said she. “ You won’t need a bell, 
father. And, oh ! ‘ that will be joyful,’ to 
know you are out in the sun again, enjoying 
yourself with other people. We can go every- 
where together, when you get used to it — to 
the grave-yard! — and you’ll see then how the 
willows have grown. And they are going 
to have the meeting in the afternoon pretty 
soon, do you know, and there aren’t any steps 
to go up, you can roll right into the chapel. 
I should think it was made for you, father. 
Oh, I’m so happy 1 ” 

Mr. Herbert could not doubt that when he 
looked at Amy. He said to himself, it must 
be worth while for him to live a little longer if 
she could get so glad over so slight a thing 
concerning him, as this affair of the cart was 
likely to prove. 


AMY CARR. 


101 


The very next morning saw Mr. Herbert in 
the street. 

You might have supposed that he was some 
great dignitary, from the way people gathered 
around him in the Park, where Amy left 
him. 

First and foremost, there was old Mr. Spin- 
gler, who came down from his house on the 
corner, about five minutes after the cart was 
wheeled into a shady place. When he took Mr. 
Herbert’s hand and shook it, he said, “ Bless 
you ! ” and “ Thank you ! ” in a way to make 
one think that some remarkable service had 
been conferred on him I When he could con- 
trol his voice sufficiently, to say anything 
connectedly, he pointed out to Mr. Herbert 
the house where he lived, and told him that he 
should regard him now as his nearest neighbor, 
and many a talk they should have together, in 
pleasant weather, under the awning. 

He took great satisfaction, also, in pointing 
out the fine new blocks of buildings erected 
since Mr. Herbert was carried home a cripple, 
three years ago. The new fountain, too, had a 
9 * 


102 


AMY CARR. 


history that must be told. But if the old gen- 
tleman had not made himself so agreeable, no 
danger that Herbert would have grown lonely 
while he sat there in his cart. 

“ Bless you I ” said Stephen, when he was 
making his report of the day to Amy at night, 
“ Bless you ! I never got sight of him for three 
hours after you went, only as I edged my way 
in between folks — so many came to see him. 
Everybody knew him, and everybody was 
glad ; and I had to look to it, you know 
that they didn’t eat him up. It’s going to 
be easy enough all the rest of it is ; for I 
heard, — I don’t know how many, telling him 
he must keep a stand for newspapers there, 
and they would all buy of him. And I’ve got 
a secret besides ! Can you keep a secret, 
Amy ? ” Amy thought she could. 

“ Mr. Spingler is going to invest in him I 
I’m to get the early papers, dozens of ’em, 
every morning, and he’s as good as set your 
father up in business ! A kind of bookstore in 
the street ! Do you understand ? ” 

Stephen was in a state of great excitement 


AMY CARR. 


103 


by tlie time he had got through this declaration 
of doings and intentions. So was Amy ; she 
cried, and did not try to liide her tears. And 
Stephen’s eyes were not dry. 

May neither of them ever know any sadder 
tears than these ! May their hearts always 
beat as strongly with thankfulness as now. 

This experiment, which Mr. Herbert perse- 
vered in making — as anybody might have 
known he would, when he had once under- 
taken it — this experiment turned out favorably 
for himself, Mr. Spingler, and everybody con- 
cerned. It became Stephen’s morning duty 
to see that the cart wheeled itself down safely 
to its corner ; and while he went on his rounds, 
more than once in the course of the twelve 
hours of his work, he was standing in front of 
the engineer’s stand, for no other purpose, 
whatever excuse he might invent, than to 
discover if everything was going on well with 
him. 

Mr. Spingler said one day to Herbert, as 
they watched the lad who was running towards 
the station, for the car&-were coming in : 


104 


AMY CARR. 


“ If anybody should adopt that boy and train 
him up to business, sir, he would make a man 
of mark. How shrewd he is ! and as honest as 
the day is long. I declare, it bothers me some- 
times, and keeps me awake nights, thinking 
what shall be done with him. If I were a 
younger man . . . or if I were doing 

business ... I’d see what could be 
done.” 

When he had said this, Mr. Spingler walked 
away from the corner, and down the street, 
with his hands clasped behind him, and his 
head bent. Nobody in those quarters would 
have noticed him, as if there were anything 
unusual in these symptoms. Mr. Spingler 
walked over that same ground, in that same 
manner, at least twenty times a day. But, 
when he came back to where Herbert sat, 
the engineer was not surprised to hear him 
begin to talk on the same subject again, as if 
the thought of Stephen had not, for a moment, 
been lost sight of. 

“Mr. Herbert,” said he, “Hid I tell you 
where I first found that lad ? ” 


AMY CARR. 


105 


“ No ; running full tilt along some one of 
the streets, I reckon.” 

“ Not at all, sir. I found him in a prayer- 
meeting. I was belated a little, myself, so I 
sat down near the door, and the door stood open. 
They were singing, I think — yes, they were 
singing, when I saw him listening just outside 
the door. He had put his basket down against 
the side of the porch, and he had a look on his 
face — perhaps you never saw that look — I can- 
not describe it, but it made him as different 
a boy from what you see when he’s at his 
trade, as you can possibly think of. Said I to 
myself, that boy must come in here, so I step- 
ped out and spoke to him, and invited him 
to take a seat in the chapel. He wouldn’t, 
he said ; he had his basket ; he only wanted 
to hear the singing. But it didn’t take much 
urging to get him in. He gave up all at once, 
and said, ‘Are you the old gentleman who 
made a speech the other day in there ? ’ 
Well, I told him, I was sometimes in the habit 
of making a few remarks. ‘If you’ll make 
another speech,’ said he, ‘ I’ll go.’ That was 


106 


AMY CARR. 


a kind of challenge I wasn’t likely to refuse. 
So, says I, ‘ Come in ! ” ‘ Lead on ! ’ said he. 
And I had to trust him, though I wouldn’t 
have been much surprised to see him running 
down the lane, as I went in at the door ; 
but he was in earnest. So was I. He fol- 
lowed in, and I did make a speech, sir. And 
I offered him up to the Lord in it. When he 
sat down again, he said to me half aloud, ‘I’ll 
stand you in that, old gentleman. That was a 
rousing speech.’ He was just as much in earn- 
est as he is about getting you down here 
mornings ; and I say we must look after Stephen 
Eider.” 

That was only one of many times that Mr.. 
Spingler was speaking such words about Ste- 
phen to Mr. Herbert. 

But the summer ended, and he was still 
merely talking. 

According to Stephen’s prophecy, Mr. Her- 
bert found himself in business almost without 
knowing it. Day after day you might have 
seen him in his place, until the autumn came 
with rain, and cold, and rheumatism ; then the 


AMY CAER. 


107 


cugincer was rarely to be found at his old 
stand ; but, sometimes, on the brighter days, 
he might be seen there for an hour or two. 
Still it was evident to him, and those most 
interested in his business, that his season’s 
work was at an end. 

Shall I say that Maria was not sorry when 
Amy told her that her grandfather would not 
go out any more until the summer came again ? 
It was not possible, surely, that the cart and the 
stand crowded the Park so much that it was not 
pleasant for her to stroll that way, when she 
had a little leisure, as she used to do I 


108 


AMY CARE. 


XIV. 

O NE evening, towards Christmas, Maria ran 
down home for a brief visit. 

Her grandfather was asleep when she went 
in, so the girls might hold their chat without 
restraint for a time. Amy was glad of this, 
for a thought that had been flitting to and fro 
through her mind for many days, had just pre- 
sented itself to her in a substantial shape, and 
she said to Maria : 

“We must get some nice, good present for 
father, Christmas day.” 

“So we must,” said Maria. The thought 
was a new one to her, but she liked it. 
“ What shall it be ? she asked. 

“I’d like it to be a nice, warm wrapper,” 
said Amy, “ only he’d think that it was mak- 
ing a sick man of him. He don’t seem half 
as bright and happy as he was when he could 




AMY CAER. 


109 


get out to the Park. Oh, Maria ! if we only 
could make it summer again right away. ” 

“ Lined with red and quilted ! ” exclaimed 
Maria. 

“ Yes ; but could we ever get him to wear it, 
do you think ? ” said Amy. 

“Besides, they cost such an awful sight of 
money.’’ 

“ Do they ? How much ? ” 

“ I’ve heard of some as low as eighteen and 
twenty dollars.” 

“ As low ! Why, Maria, what are you think- 
ing about? You know I don’t mean that 
kind,” said Amy, greatly dismayed. 

“ Of course,” said Maria, laughing at Amy’s 
consternation. “ That’s the kind we make for 
gentlemen. We have made three lately. I’ve 
learned to quilt with the sewing machine, and 
I believe I can learn to do anything with my 
hands. The girls say they never saw any one 
so quick.” 

“ Do they I I’m glad ; oh, I’m glad of that !” 

“ What do you say to a pair of slippers, 
then?” 


10 


110 


AMY CARR. 


“ Oh, Maria 

“ To be sure ; he wouldiiT want a pair, would 
he ?” said Maria, blushing scarlet. She knew 
what Amy thought, how astonishing it was that 
Maria could forget, for a single instant, her 
grandfather’s misfortune. “ Well,” she went on 
impatiently, “ I suppose you’ve got it in your mind 
what you are going to give him. So, what is it ? 
there’s no use of my saying what it shall be.” 

“ Don’t you think a new coat would — ” Amy 
hesitated, and broke off without finishing her 
sentence. 

“ That’s the very thing !” exclaimed Maria ; 
she spoke with all her heart. 

“ The old one is so patched up ; the last time 
I mended the sleeves I couldn’t find any cloth 
to match, the coat had faded so. He laughed, 
but I don’t think he felt much like it. For 
when father was able to be about he never 
wore such clothes.” 

“No more he did ! I know it.” 

“ Stephen Rider has been buying him a nice 
new coat, and you don’t know how different he 
looks. So would father !” 


AMY CARR. 


Ill 


“Has Stephen? well, that’s a comfort, any 
way. Why, Amy, do you know what a regular 
ragamuffin he had got to look like ? And he 
always will stare up at the window where the 
girls sit, and nod. Then the girls laugh at 
me. I’m glad he’s got a new coat.” 

Maria was so glad it seemed she had quite 
forgotten, the other coat they had been 
talking about, but Amy went back to that 
subject. 

“ Such nice stuff as it’s made of, too !” said 
she. “ It’s just the color for father. It won’t 
fade, and it won’t show stains, ax^d it looks so 
warm and comfortable for winter. I went to 
the shop where they keep such clothes ready 
made, and I found one just the right color ; 
just the same as Stephen’s. Don’t you want to 
go and look at it ?” 

“ Yes, sometime,” said Maria, with a yawn 
that showed she was not very eager to com- 
plete the proposed purchase. 

In fact she was not more than half pleased 
that Amy had gone so far as to loolc for a gar- 
ment without first consulting with her. 


112 


AMY CARR. 


Amy understood that Maria was not pleased, 
and said, as if she would apologize, 

“I was going by the shop and went in to 
save time. Besides, you know how foolish I 
am. It wasn’t to save time altogether, though 
I had that in my head, too, but I never can feel 
easy when I get a thought unless I do some- 
thing about it right away. I wish you could 
go to-night and look, Maria.” 

“ It’s a nice time to judge of colors by lamp 
light, to be sure,” said Maria, laughing. “ I 
wouldn’t trust your eyes about it, though, night 
or day. I’ll run in sometime before long and 
look, seeing you’re so anxious. And I’m anx- 
ious, too, of course. How much will it cost ?” 

“ Six dollars. That will be three apiece, you 
know.” 

Three dollars 1 Maria did not say she 
thought that would be a costly present, extrav- 
agant for them, but she thought so. Still she 
pretended to think it very cheap. For of course 
she would not be outdone by Amy in generosity. 


AMY CAER. 


113 


XV. 

M any days, a whole week, iiuw passed 
away. Christmas was drawing nearer 
and nearer, and no purchase had yet been made. 
When Maria came home again she made no 
manner of allusion to the coat ; neither did 
Amy. She saw Maria was thinking about other 
things, and she knew she would be vexed if she 
were reminded of the coming Christmas, as if 
she had forgotten it. But at last, when she saw 
it would not be safe to leave the business unset- 
tled any longer, Amy asked Maria if she had 
looked in at the clothing store yet. 

“No,” said Maria, in a resentful way, just as 
Amy had feared ; “ when have I had the time ? 
You seem to think I am a lady of leisure.” 

“ No, I don^t. I know youhe hurried all the 
time, Maria j only I^m so afraid they will all be 
gone.” 

10 ^ 


114 


AMY CARR. 


“What if they are? Don’t you suppose 
there are twenty more as good ? They adver- 
tise that they’ve thirty thousand coats to sell. 
I guess you and I will be able to suit ourselves 
out of all that lot, even if we wait an hour or 
two.” 

This answer provoked Amy so much that she 
resolved she would say no more about the pres- 
ent. She had done her part. And if I should 
add that she took a good deal of credit to her- 
sdf, thinking how much more desirous she was 
of surprising her father Christmas day than 
Maria seemed to be, it would be the exact truth. 
And if I said, moreover, that she compared 
herself and her generosity with Maria’s, to her 
own great satisfaction, reminding herself of the 
fact that Maria was ashamed to be seen walk- 
ing with her in the street when she had on her 
working dress, and had proved it twice since 
she herself had appeared in that new bonnet, 
I should say what was strictly true. Amy’s 
pride was a dififerent kind of pride from Ma- 
ria’s ; but if she was going to sit down and 
think while she worked, as often she did, of 




AMY CARR. 


115 


Marians neglects and her selfishness, was not 
there some danger that she for her part would 
grow up into a self-righteous woman? It is 
easier, indeed, to see the faults of others than 
to correct our own ; and Amy was at this very 
hour proving it. She kept her resolution and 
said no more to Maria about the coat. 

Three days before Christmas, she decided 
upon making her purchase without Maria’s as- 
sistance. She found on inquiry that she could 
buy a jacket, and a jacket she determined it 
should be. 

While she was thinking about it, and about 
Maria, with some bitterness and indignation, 
Maria came down to the house. 

“ Oh, you’re here,” said she, looking in at the 
kitchen door. “ Where’s grandfather ?” 

“ He’s in there,” said Amy, wondering at 
such a question ; “ where should he be but in 
the house, and perhaps dozing at this hour of 
the twilight. 

“What I wanted to know, is he awake?” 
asked Maria, looking at Amy as if very much 
surprised by her short answer. 


116 


AMY CARE. 


“ He wasn^t awake just now,” said Amy. 

“ I hoped he would be taking his nap. Are 
you cross? If jon’re not, get on your hood 
and come. I can go now and look at — you 
know what. But I can’t stay a minute. I just 
got out for half an hour ; and I’ve run all the 
way. We’re, oh, so crowded with work. Get- 
ting everybody ready for Christmas.” 

That was all true. And Maria looked so 
tired and so hurried, that Amy of course could 
not do otherwise than get on her overshoes, 
hood, and shawl, and they went off together. 

“ Now,” said Maria, as Amy softly closed the 
door, “ if grandpa’ should call you in a minute, 
you’ll be back to answer ; so quick, he won’t 
guess we’ve been out, and we must just fly.” 

And as they ran along together down the 
lane into the street, they did seem almost to 
fly ; and when they spoke to each other their 
words had a kindly, friendly sound. 

It was a good many blocks down Greene 
street to the furnishing rooms of Brown & Son, 
but the time that she was absent seemed very 
short to Amy, and was very brief ; when she 


AMY CARR. 


117 


came back she came alone, bringing a big bun- 
dle that must be hidden away till Christmas. 

They had bought the coat and paid for it. 
But Maria had borrowed her money, and was 
in debt for it to Stephen Bider I A thing that 
was hardly to be expected of Maria. 


118 


AMY CARR. 


XVL 

T he reason why Maria was so vexed when 
Amy asked her a second time about the 
Christmas present for her father, was, that on 
asking Miss Butler for three dollars, she found, 
to her surprise and dismay, that so far from 
Miss Butler’s being in debt to her for service, 
she herself owed more than she had paid for. 
It was the bonnet, and the cloak, and the rib- 
bon, this thing and that, she could read the 
charge with her own eyes, if memory would not 
serve her I She felt a good deal of dismay 
when she found how these things stood on the 
books of deb t,.an^cr edit, but it was not difficult 
for Maria to explain the matter to herself. A 
girl couldn’t serve in Miss Butler’s shop in the 
dress of a beggar. She couldn’t sit in Miss 
Butler’s pew in church with a shabby bonnet 
on her head. The only extravagance of which 


AMY CARR. 


119 


Maria could accuse herself of was the bonnet 
ribbon she had bought for Amy ! And she ac- 
cused herself of that ! 

At last she said to herself that a poor girl 
could not be expected to do any great things at 
making Christmas presents. It was a very, 
very little while since she began to earn any- 
thing. Her grandfather would be perfectly 
willing to wait for his present. He wouldn^t 
expect a gift ; he wouldn^t like it if they spent 
their money on him that way. It only would 
remind him how helpless he was. He wouldn’t 
thank them if they took their wages to buy him 
a new coat ! 

But, though, when Maria said this to herself, 
she said it as if the matter were now arranged, 
and there was no more to be done about it, 
you know of course it was not settled to her 
mind. The nearer Christmas drew the more 
unsettled she became. One night this thought 
flashed upon her, that on this Christmas, for 
the first time in her life, she had the power out 
of her own earnings to prove her gratitude 
and love for her grandfather. What if she 


120 


AMY CARR. 


had spent her money ? That did not change 
the fact that she was earning money, and that 
had she not spent it on herself she should have 
had it to spend on him ! 

This thought tormented her. She could not 
shut it out of her head any more than Adam 
could help hearing God^s voice in the Garden. 
Before she had got rid of this thought the sub- 
ject of the sleigh ride came up ! 

And the dinner ! 

Miss Butler expected all the girls to dine 
with her on Christmas day, when she gave them 
a feast. And Jane Kice, with Miss Butler^s 
consent, had invited all the hands in the work- 
rooms and the show-room to go with her to 
her father’s house in the country. The sleigh- 
ing was excellent ; there would be the full 
moon to light them ; and what could be more 
splendid than the ideal Miss Butler volun- 
teered to furnish a large sleigh that would 
carry them all. Such a Christmas as they 
looked forward to could not come but once a 
year, you may be sure. 

But how was Maria going to manage all these 


AMY CAER. 


121 


things — the dinner and the ride? Amy and 
her grandfather expected her to spend the holi- 
day with them. It was clear that, at whatever 
cost, she must bear her part in the gift-giving. 

Finally she thought of Stephen Rider ; he 
could help her out of her trouble, and accord- 
ingly she went in search of him. He was not 
hard to find. 

When she saw him standing at the corner, 
where he usually stationed himself as the day 
waned, she looked as if she were very much 
surprised to find him there, and passed by him 
in great haste ; but she had not gone very far 
when her pace slackened, she looked behind 
her, and after a few hesitating steps turned 
boldly back in the direction whence she came. 

Stephen was watching Maria all this while. 
He was thinking what a fine-looking figure she 
made in her handsome clothes. In her hand- 
some clothes, I said. Ho I mean by that, that 
Maria was arrayed this winter in very great 
splendor, or, like some of the ladies who 
come out from their dressing-rooms to loiter up 
and down the pavements, as idle as the idlest 
11 


122 


AMY CARR. 


and most useless things that were ever seen on 
earth; a shame to their father’s house? No. 
But Stephen had never worn any but the 
coarsest garments himself. If he was not in 
rags, it was because his mother never ceased 
from patching ; and there was such a contrast 
in these days between the girls, and the gay 
colors Maria put on lighted up her showy face 
in such a way that it was no great wonder if 
he thought her magnificent, and hardly knew 
that there was a difference between her attire 
and that of the gayest lady in Hamilton. He 
stopped whistling as she came near, and won- 
dered whether she would speak to him, for 
sometimes she passed by as if she did not see 
him, when he felt sure she did. He felt quite 
awed for a moment as he looked at Maria, till 
she said, so friendly, and as if she were confer- 
ring a great favor upon him, 

“ Stephen, you are the very one I was look- 
ing for. I want to borrow a little money of 
you. Have you any you can lend me a few 
days as well as not ?” 

“ Guess so, Maria,” said Stephen, taking out 


AMY CARR. 


123 


his old leather pocket-book. It was the same 
one he had carried since he first began ped- 
dling in the streets. “How much do you 
want 

“ Three dollars.’’ Stephen looked up at her, 
in his quick, shrewd way ; he wondered if she 
were really in earnest. Then, seeing that she 
was, without asking any questions, he drew out 
a bank bill and gave it to her. 

“ Can you spare it ?” said Maria. “ Are you 
sure ?” 

“ Yes,” said he, in his manly way, clasping 
the old pocket-book and restoring it to his 
pocket. “ Do you want any more ?” 

“ No, indeed. And I shall pay this back in 
no time. I mean, just as soon as Miss Butler 
pays me what I’ve earned.” 

“ Well,” said Stephen, “don’t be alarmed. I 
an’t in a hurry.” And Maria felt easier when 
she heard him say it, for now she knew that 
she might take her time about paying him. 

“I’m sure I’m very much obliged to you, 
Stephen,” said she. “Are you doing a good 
business now?” 


124 


AMY CARR. 


“ Never better ; never so good.” 

“ That’s what you always said, ever since I 
can recollect. You must be getting ricli.” 

“ Oh, yes — veryP 

“ You will be, any way.” 

“ Oh, you’ve turned fortune-teller, Maria I 
Well, I’ll believe in all the good luck you’ve a 
mind to promise me. How are you getting on 
yourself?” 

“ Fine. I like it very well. I shall have 
better wages by and by.” 

“ Is if coming true what the old woman told ? 
You remember ?” 

“That nonsense! I’ve forgotten all about 
it,” said Maria. But she had not forgotten. 


AMY CARR. 


125 


XVII. 

T he next evening, after the purchase of the 
coat, it was Christmas Eve, you remember, 
Maria came home again, with permission to re- 
main all night. 

When they were alone, Amy took advantage 
of the first moment, and said, 

“ Now we must arrange about the dinner to- 
morrow — what we shall have, and what time 
we shall have it.’^ 

“Won’t you have it at the usual hour?” 
asked Maria. She didn’t look at Amy when 

I 

she asked it, but stooped down to stroke the 
back of the old tom-cat, lying in a corner of 
the hearth. 

“ I don’t know,” said Amy. “ Shall we ? 
'Just what hour you like best. There’s one good 
long day we can manage to suit ourselves. 
There isn’t a single hour, from nine o’clock in 
the morning till six at night, that we can’t have 
our dinner, if we choose.” 

11 * 


126 


AMY CARR. 


“There’s always something to pay,” said 
Maria, apparently very much vexed. “ I won’t 
be here to dinner, and I’m so sorry — you don’t 
know.” 

“ Not be here, Maria ! you won’t ! Oh, 
Maria ! father will be so disappointed : he has 
talked about it over and over again.” 

“Has he? I’m very sorry. Just think of 
that ! sorry that he wants me ! I don’t mean 
that ; but I am sorry to disappoint him. But 
I can’t help myself. There’s no use of crying 
over it. Miss Butler is very particular about 
some things. If she makes any arrangements, 
she won’t have them interfered with. When 
she says there’s a thing she would like to have 
done, the girls all know what she means by it ; 
they wouldn’t, any of them, dare to do differ- 
ent ; and I can’t, if I mean to stay in her 
house.” 

“ I know,” said poor Amy, ready to burst 
into tears, but pushing back the sorrow, that 
she might put forth the argument, “ but I’m 
sure if you should remind Miss Butler about 
father, and how few holidays we have and can 


AMY CARR. 


127 


spend together, I7n sure, Maria, if you told 
her, or if you’d let me, she would Ido willing 
you should come home.” 

“ Well, now, suppose all the rest of the girls 
should get up an excuse — ” 

“ Get up an excuse ! ” exclaimed Amy hastily. 
“ Do you call it an excuse ! I don’t ; but it’s a 
good reason. ' You don’t get it up either, it’s 
right here on hand. If she should come and 
look at father, I guess she’d understand us 
quick enough — we shouldn’t have to beg very 
hard to get you off.” 

“ That shows that you don’t know anything 
about it, said Maria. “She wouldn’t let me 
off, and I’m not going down on my knees to 
beg it of her.” 

For a good many minutes not a word was 
exchanged between the girls. At last, said 
Amy: 

“ Well then, Maria, let us know what hour 
your dinner is — we can chctnge ours, you know. 
We can put it off quite late, if you say so. 
Father wouldn’t care. And it would be very 
pretty and pleasant to have lights on the table. 


128 


AMY CAER. 


We could make it bright and cheerful, and 
then we shouldn’t be in a hurry to get through. 
And in the evening may be Stephen and his 
mother will come in for a little while. And I 
wouldn’t wonder a bit if Mr. Spingler came. 
He comes so often.” 

Maria lauglted outright. 

“ What a delightful picture to be sure — you 
do choose the queerest company ! ” said she. 
“ No, no, Amy ; don’t you tliink another bit 
about me. Just go on, and have your dinner 
at the time grandpa’ likes it, and I’ll explain 
it to him that I can't come, and he understands 
better than you seem to do about these people 
who employ working hands. It’s very kind of 
Miss Butler, though, to be at the trouble 
of getting up. a great dinner, and you know 
this is my first year there. How queer it 
would look if I couldn’t stay when I’ve dined 
home ever and ever so many Sundays.” 

“ Well, but that sounds as if you were going 
to keep on eating all day long. Won’t you 
ever be through from noon till dark V 
“ Why — don’t you know — didn’t I tell you ? 


AMY CARE. 


129 


Have I got to make you miserable all over 
again exclaimed Mar.ia. 

“What do you mean, Maria said. Amy, 
the words seemed to choke her — could this be 
Christmas Eve, — the time that is generally so 
Crowded with joyful expectations for the mor- 
row? — it was only crowded with disappoint- 
ment for Amy. 

“ Why, I can^t come home to-morrow at all 
— not even after the dinner I I have got to go 
home with Jane Rice ; all the girls are going. 
She lives in the country, you know, and her sis- 
ter^s wedding is to-morrow night, and we are 
all invited. Miss Butler furnishes the sleigh, 
and the horses, and driver. Oh, how I wish 
there was room enough for you, Amy 

“ I couldn’t go,” said Amy, bitterly. 

“ You’d find out you could, if there was only 
a place I could tuck you in,” said Maria. 

“ I wouldn’t go, anyway, and leave father.” 

“ Oh, well, perhaps you wouldn’t ! But now, 
Amy, see here, don’t you know this is all your 
own getting up, making so much about Christ- 
mas and the dinner, and having me here ? I 


130 


AMY CAER. 




know it’s all kind, and pleasant, and just exact- 
ly right, as far as you’re concerned — you’re 
always in the right, you know, and I never was, 
for a single minute in "my life, and never expect 
to be ; but grandfather never used to think so 
very much about Christmas day, that I re- 
member.” 

“ What of that ?” said Amy. 

“Well, now, you’re getting fierce! I only 
meant that you’re putting him up to expect 
a great deal more pleasure out of to-morrow 
than I ever heard of his expecting before.” 

Harsh words rushed to Amy’s lips ; angry 
thoughts were in her heart ; but she paused 
before she spoke them, and in that brief mo- 
ment, as she looked at Maria, her wrath passed 
away. She seemed to see Miss Dix in the 
shadows of the room, and one beside Miss Dix, 
who made the darkness light ; and they, her best 
human and best divine friends, waited for her 
words. What, then, should she say to Maria ? 

“ You are away so much, you forget how 
great little things seem to him, when he can’t 
get about and do any work that would help 


AMY CARR. 


131 


him to forget how miserably off he is. Oh, 
Maria ! you don’t know how glad I was when 
lie-got so interested thinking about the Christ- 
mas dinner and arranging what we should 
have, and talking about having you home. 
But it isn’t your fault either — you have so 
much work to do, and you see so many 
people.” 

“ He used to get us Christmas presents, too, 
when I was here sometimes in the holidays,” 
said Maria, softened by Amy’s words, and still 
more by her manner of speaking them, for it 
was gentle, and full of kindliness. 

“ I knew you couldn’t forget that,” said 
Amy, “how he used to fill the stockings we 
would leave hanging from the mantle-shelf — 
and how we used to run down stairs in the 
dark, to this very room, and carry them baclv 
to bed with us. It was as much as we could 
do to wait till morning for light enough to see 
our treasures.” 

“ Yes,” said Maria, “ I wish everything was 
just as it used to be ! How different it was.” 

“Before you came,” said Amy, “this is 


132 


AMY CAER. 


what makes Christmas such a solemn time to 
him and me — the very last Christmas mother 
was here — though she was so sick, so low, she 
remembered to ask him if he knew it was 
Christmas Eve. I heard her as I was going 
away to bed, and I heard him say, ‘ Oh, yes !’ 
and he called me back to hang up my stock- 
ing. She put in the presents herself, he told 
me afterwards ; but when I came down in the 
morning it wasn’t to get my stocking, it was to 
see her! She was dying, Maria. . . . He 
always reminds me of it every Christmas day, 
and says, ‘ don’t forget her Amy,’ as if I ever 
could.” 

“ Of course you never could,” said Maria. 
“ I never shall forget her either. Grandma’ 
was always so kind to me when I came here 
for a visit.” 

“ How happy it used to be ! ... I think 

he will have a good time to-morrow, though, 
for he said this morning something I haven’t 
heard him say very often, Maria.” 

“ What did he say, Amy ?” 

Amy ansy^ered in a low voice, “ Bless the 


AMY CARE. 


133 


Lord, 0 my soul, and praise Him for all his 
benefits.” 

This conversation made Maria feel too sad. 
She wanted to break it up, so she lighted a 
lamp and walked about the room, carrying 
the lamp with her, and at last she opened 
the door of the cupboard in the corner. 

“ What^s this !” she exclaimed, looking 
within — “ a tart ! Why, who made that ?” 

“ That’s a surprise,” said Amy. 

“ Who made it, though ? You didn’t ?” 

“Yes ; don’t it look quite respectable ?” 

“Quite! I should think so. It’s beautiful 
. . . crimped edges and all. Why, Amy I 
And there is the turkey, too.” 

“ Isn’t it a funny little one ?” 

“ Tender as a chicken and just big enough. 
It won’t take forever to cook it. You must 
baste it well. I wish — ” but whatever her 
wish might be, Maria did not express it. Per- 
haps for a single minute she wished that sho 
could find it possible to renounce the great din- 
ner, the sleigh-ride, and the wedding, and spend 
to-morrow in the old, dull house, down the lane I 
12 


134 


AMY CABR. 


XVIIL 

4^11 JERRY Christmas!” 

ItX How many milliom voices spoke these 
words at sunrise ! How many millions more 
whose voices are dumb, whose lips are cold, have 
spoken them — your forefathers and mine — the 
loves of your heart and mine ! How they have 
borne the song of the angels from generation 
to generation. And One who sits now at the 
right hand of God, exalted, our Saviour, he 
has heard all the song and the shouting : “ Good 
will to man !” Be merry, be glad, for He who 
is our gladness and our life has appeared, has 
taken away the darkness, has subdued the 
death, and the world lias swung free from its 
curse under the Hand that was nailed to the 
Cross of Pilate ; the Hand that was laid on 
children’s heads to bless them ; the Hand that 
touched the world’s leprosy and healed it ; the 


AMY CARR. 


135 


Hand that Mary held when the little one 
walked by her side while he was growing in 
grace and in favor with. God and man; the 
Hand that broke the Bread that sustains the 
life of every penitent creature ; the Hand that 
knocks at the door of the human heart, and 
says, Open to me ; I will come in and make 
my abode with thee.^’ 

“ Merry Christmas What streams of gold 
have poured fort|i to make the Christmas 
bright ! And all for love ! And this love 
called out by God’s love, how sacred it be- 
comes in such connection ! How shall we 
prove our gratitude to God so well as in the 
manifesting of our love to those around us? 
“ Good will to man !” Take up the song, 
and let the song of the heart be the law of the 
life. 

“ Merry Christmas !” 

Who spoke ? 

There was not a sound in the house. The 
voice came from outside — from out of doors, 
where it was almost as still, for the sun had 
but just risen. 


136 


AMY CAER. 


It was Stephen Eider, of course, who spoke. 
He was making one swift circuit of the cottage 
before he ran down to the station. 

They all heard the greeting in the house. 

Mr. Herbert heard it. He had wakened 
early, and was dreaming till he wakened. And 
of what was he dreaming? That he stood 
with the fireman of the Eagle, his favorite 
engine, on the platform, talking about the 
capital time they were making. 

It was a fine winter morning, clear, bright, 
and very cold. He must swing his arms now 
and then and stamp his feet to keep the blood 
in good circulation. How beautiful the winter 
fields looked under their covering of white and 
frozen snow! How splendid were the trees, 
coated, branch and twig, with frost ; all the 
diamonds in the world hung on one of these 
elms could not have made it shine so gloriously, 
as all the trees of the forest shone, when the 
sunlight fell upon tliem. 

“ Splendid skating 1 ’’ he says to the fireman, 
as they fly past the black swamp ponds. They 
run through the villages without pause, for 


AMY CAEE. 


137 


this, you understand, is the express train that 
takes notice only of the large towns. 

By and by he sees the tall spires of the city 
churches. He has brought hundreds of pas- 
sengers, who trusted their lives in their hands, 
to the very doors of home, and he also is at 
home. 

That leap from the engine platform, just 
as Stephen shouted, wakened him. 

Ah ! ... He is old Herbert, indeed. . . . 

But — that was such a leap as he shall never 
make again. 

An instant since he was Herbert the engi- 
neer, strong, hale, the safest man on the line. 
Now he is Herbert the cripple, lying in his bed. 
where he has lain wishing many times that 
he lay in his grave instead. 

Wishing that this morning? No ; yester- 
day he said, and Amy heard him, “ Bless the 
Lord, 0 ray soul, and forget not all his bene- 
fits ! And that song, though it left his lips, 
did not leave his heart also. The heart can 
sing it yet. 

Oh, to think of the thousands like him, 
12 * 


138 


AMY CARR. 


whose Christmas is not rmrry^ yet is resigned 
and thankful ! 

What victory can be compared with the 
soul’s victory over the world, when it submits 
to the will of God, and in the valley of death 
looks for light to the star of Bethlehem ! 

“ Merry Christmas /” Amy heard it. 

She had already kindled a fire in the stove, 
and was sweeping the kitchen, though it was 
very early, for Mr. Herbert still continued in 
the practice of tliat habit of early rising he had 
formed when his days were brimfull of activity. 

Before she came out of the bedroom Amy 
left on the coverlet, under Maria’s hand, a little 
paper parcel ; it was wrapped in Marians stock- 
ing. 

This was a gift for Maria. A pair of under- 
sleeves knit of bright soft wools to keep Maria’s 
arms warm ; for Amy had noticed how much 
she seemed to feel the cold since she wore those 
open sleeves. 

Miss Dix showed her how to knit them ; and, 
considering that Amy was not practiced in such 
work, her success was quite remarkable ; the 


AMY CARR. 


139 


sleeves were very well shaped, and the knitting 
quite even ; and there were the sleeves ! no- 
body could tell what an amount of comfort was 
hid in them. 

Mr. Herbert had watched their growth with 
constant interest, for he was in Amy^s secret, 
and shared her anticipations of Maria’s satis- 
faction in the gift. Amy had been a long while 
about them. You know how such things are 
made, how slie guarded against surprises ; how 
she seized on every spare moment ; how happy 
she was when she saw that the work she had 
undertaken with a good deal of doubt, and con- 
tinued with a good deal of anxiety, was going 
to result in sure success. You know how she 
discovered that the knitting would take a great 
deal more wool than she imagined ; and that 
she bought skein after skein, till it seemed as 
if she would never have done, and that she said 
to herself, if she had known how much the 
sleeves were going to cost, very likely she would 
never have undertaken them ; and you under- 
stand how glad she was when finally they were 
done, that she had undertaken them, and count- 


140 


AMY CARR. 


ed the cost of them no more, for joy of the 
thought that Maria would not feel the cold 
now nearly so much, nor shiver so much, as she 
had done from her bare arms, since the winter 
set in. 

And while she kindled the fire and swept the 
kitchen, Amy was all the time hearkening — 
moving about so noiselessly, and hearkening for 
some sound in the bed-room that should tell of 
Maria’s awaking. 

By and by, as the breakfast hour drew near, 
not hearing any sound, she went and opened 
the bedroom door, and behold there was no 
Maria ! 

The window stood open and she had gone. 

Amy stood there in the middle of tlie room 
aghast, looking around her in dumb amazement. 
While she stood there Maria passed by the 
window, and seeing Amy, called out, 

“ What are you doing in there ?” 

“ I’m looking for you,” said Amy. “ Where 
are you ?” 

“ Scolding Santa Claus. I had to come out 
into the yard to do it. I was going to get back 


AMY CARR. 


141 


the way I went out, but now you may as well 
unlock the kitchen door and let me in.’^ 

“ It’s unlocked, Maria,” said Amy. 

So Maria came in at the door. She had 
dressed herself in the sleeves she found on her 
bed, and now began to exhibit them : 

“Stockings for my arms!” she said, “what 
do you think of them ?” 

“They look comfortable,” said Amy, as if 
she had never seen them before. 

“ Do they ? I suppose that’s what they were 
made for.” 

“No great beauty about them, though,” said 
Amy. 

“ You’re jealous because you haven’t any ; 
that’s what’s the matter of you, Santa Claus 
and I think they’re beautiful.” 

“ Did he have on his spectacles when he said 
so?” 

“ It must have taken you a great while to 
make them, Amy. What did you do it for ?” 

“ You had better ask Santa Claus ; he prob- 
ably knows more about that than I do.” 

“ Miss Dix showed you how, I suppose. I 


142 


AMY CARR. 


never saw a prettier stitcli. But it must have 
taken ever so much worsted.” 

“ Where have you been, Maria ?” 

“Trying the sleeves in the air, to see if 
they’re good for anything ; and they are, I find. 
When you see Mr. Santa Claus again, give him 
that for me.” 

Maria came up to Amy and kissed her, and 
at the same time gave her a little book. 

“ He’s got to learn that book by heart,” said 
she, “ tell him I say so and so saying, Maria 
went into the bedroom and left her sliawl and 
bonnet. 

When she camfi out again Amy stood looking 
at the little book, turning the pages over and 
over, and on every page there was a hymn. 
No gift could have pleased her as well, and 
Maria understood that when she saw how smil- 
ing her face was. 

“ I forgot it last night,” said she, as she came 
up to Amy and looked over her shoulder ; “ did 
you ever hear of anything like that ? and that’s 
what I went out for to get it. Now we must 
take out grandfather’s coat.” 


AMY CARR. 


143 


Amy kissed the book and laid it on the man- 
tle-shelf, and they now busied themselves in pre- 
paring breakfast, and in helping their grand- 
father out to it, and in giving him his splendid 
Christmas present, and in cheering him up 
when he seemed disposed to look at them rather 
sadly, and to speak of himself as a burden, an'd 
to shed tears indeed over the new coat. 

They succeeded in bringing two or three 
broad smiles to his face while they were at 
breakfast, and I donT suppose that he thought 
as lightly of Marians assurance, that he never 
had looked so young and handsome, as he pre- 
tended to do. 

She was very gay at the breakfast, telling a 
great many things that had happened in the . 
shop, and about the queer customers they some- 
times had, but nothing about the Christmas 
dinner or the wedding party. She left that for 
Amy to attend to. She wanted her to manage 
it after she should be gone, but Amy said. 

Why, Maria, what if father shouldn’t like 
it.’’ 

“ He won’t care ! You can tell him, and of 


144 


AMY CARR. 


course he won’t care. He’ll see that I can’t 
help it.” 

“ Yes, but he won’t see how you could help 
talking with him about it. You don’t belong 
to Miss Butler quite as much as you belong to 
him.” 

Pshaw, what a notion that is !” said Maria. 
But by and by she came to Amy and said, 

“ Tell him !” and after that she sat down be- 
side her grandfather, and nodded at Amy to go 
on. Amy understood what this meant, — that 
Maria would not tell him herself, and expected 
her to intercede. So she said, 

“ Father, you must make the most of Maria, 
for you’ll lose her pretty soon. Miss Butler 
wants her to come over there and dine.” 

“ Miss Butler ! Christmas ?” 

“ She gets up a great dinner and wants all 
the hands,” said Maria. “ Did you ever hear 
anything so stupid ?” 

“Well, I suppose it’s her way,” said Mr. 
Herbert, “ we can have our Christmas any time, 
though. W e won’t interfere with Miss Butler.” 

“ I wouldn’t mind,” began Maria, “ but” 


AMY CARR. 


145 


“ Oh^ well, you mustn’t put any buts in the 
way ; we must accommodate ourselves to our 
circumstances, girls, if they won’t accommodate 
themselves to us ; I find that’s the true way to 
get on comfortably in this world. Tf a thing is 
allowed to take place that you didn’t expect, 
and wouldn’t have had happen for all the world, 
if you could have prevented it, why, accommo- 
date yourself to it, and you will be helped 
through — ^you will certainly be helped through ! 
When you are about to shed your old coat, 
somebody will be sure to have a new one on 
hand for you ! That somebody is Providence, 
girls. He works by human instruments, and I 
hold He has employed you two to look after 
me ! I’m suited with the choice He has made 
of my helpers.” 

So he rambled on ; and he had got a good 
way from the thing that Maria began to say, 
but did not intend to finish. She was now 
looking at Amy in a way that instructed Amy 
she was to continue the conversation. So Amy 
said, 

“ If you are suited, father, it’s the great thing 
13 


146 


AMY CARR. 


that Maria and I want. What could we ever 
wish for so much as to make you comfortable 
and easy about everything, and do everything 
to please you. Maria wanted me to tell you 
the worst part of it ; she can’t come home to 
stay with us a bit to-day. She’s got to go on 
a ride after dinner ; they want to have her ; 
one of the girls is going to take the rest to her 
father’s in the country, her sister is going to be 
married, and if you say yes, Maria is going too.” 

“ Is that it ?” said Mr. Herbert, looking at 
Maria. 

Maria, who had not thought it necessary to 
ask consent, here looked at her grandfather and 
said, 

“ What shall I do ?” 

“Why,” said he, “when I was young we 
made a great deal of a sleighride in the coun- 
try. You don’t get many chances ; I’d be sorry 
if you couldn’t go. You can come and talk 
with us any other evening — Saturday — and 
then we’ll have our merry Christmas night. 
Anyway, we have begun the day well all to- 
gether.” 


AMY CARR. 


147 


So that affair was well settled, and Maria 
went off with a clear conscience ; they had 
smiled so kindly on her pleasant prospects. 

The Christmas that began with a disappoint- 
ment for Amy did not end with one. The vis- 
itors who could best enliven the day came^one 
after another to visit the engineer. Many a 
gift they brought that should make housekeep- 
ing easy for weeks and weeks to come. And 
Stephen came with his mother — ^not least wel- 
come of guests — and at last came Mr. Spingler. 
He remained with them through the evening. 
I shall not repeat all he said ; there was one 
sentence he dropped, however, as he was going 
away, which I cannot forbear recording. He 
said, “ Mr. Herbert, IVe been a. long while 
making up my mind about Stephen, but, IH^e 
finally come to a decision ; but you must let 
me keep my secret a little longer. I think 
you’ll approve of the way I’ve settled him, sir. 
I think you’ll approve of it. If you don’t, it 
will all fall through.” 


148 


AMY CARR. 


XIX. 

M ^RIA did not come home ^gain till the 
Sunday after Christmas, and then if the 
choice had been given her she would have 
chosen not to come. 

This great day of pleasure had done anything 
except prepare the way for pleasure. Maria 
had been sick and miserable all this while. 
She took a bad cold on the sleighride, and had 
been suffering from it ever since, trying to keep 
up and about her work, but growing more and 
more ill every day until Sunday, when Miss 
Butler sent her home with instructions to re- 
main there until she was recovered. 

It was many and many a day before the in- 
fluenza broke up ; and a great time of worry 
and impatience, and of counting the hours that 
must pass before she should be able to go back 
to the shop. 

One evening Miss Butler came and insisted 




AMY CARR. 


149 


on sending a doctor. He attended Maria for 
several days in succession. Twice or thrice the 
girls came down from the shop ; but these visits 
did not serve to reconcile her to her sickness, 
neither did they increase her patience. She 
was, I am sorry to say, no great comfort to her 
grandfather in these days. Everything troubled 
her. The visits of the doctor, for there was 
another debt accumulating : tlie visits of the 
girls, who would be sure to look at, the old 
house precisely as she now looked at it, since 
she had become accustomed to the fine furni- 
ture of Miss Butler’s show-rooms. 

Then it was so stupid to try and keep up a 
conversation with her grandfather, and see him 
falling asleep when she was thinking that she 
had made herself agreeable to him. And how 
many times must she listen to the old stories 
he told, and pretend that they were new to 
her ? 

In addition to all these annoyances, there 
was the influenza that kept her a wrenched 
prisoner. Cough! cough! from morning till 
night ; and it was worse from night till morn- 
13 * 


150 


AMY CARR. 


ing. Not one of tlie girls, beside herself, had 
paid such a price for the Christmas ride. 

One day she had a fright. 

Stephen Rider came into the kitchen and 
brought a newspaper for her grandfather, and 
asked her how she was getting on with her 
cold. Now he was in the habit of running in 
on such an errand almost every day, for he took 
it upon himself to supply Mr. Herbert with the 
news ; apd he had several times come into the 
kitchen since Maria was staying at home. 
But the instant she now saw him, she thought 
of the money she had borrowed of him, and im- 
agined that had her grandfather been asleep, 
he would have asked her about it. 

Nothing in fact was farther from his thought. 
But how relieved she felt when he was actually 
gone! She set about reading the newspaper 
the moment he closed the door, and wlien her 
grandfather fell asleep she sat and listened to 
the ticking of the clock, and resolved that in 
two days at the farthest she would go back to 
the shop. 

She was obliged to put it off for two days, 


AMY CARR. 


151 


for she knew it was impossible for her to go 
to-morrow. Nobody would have listened to it ; 
besides, she did not feel able to go. But oh, to 
be back in the work-room with tlie girls ! to 
be in the show-room among the ladies ! to look 
out in the busy street and see the sleighs and 
the buffalo-robes, and the furs and the velvets, 
the satins and all the gay colors ! 

From thinking of these things, it was not so 
very strange that she should begin to dream 
again over the words of the old fortune-teller ; 
and when she was on that ground of enchant- 
ment, it was no surprise that she should bethink 
her of the looking-glass hanging over Amy's 
table, and go in to survey herself ! And so from 
one thing to another, to get rid of her tiresome 
seif and of time, that hung so heavy on her 
hands, at last Maria began looking through 
and arranging the drawers of the old bureau 
which had been her grandmother's and her 
mother's, and was now used by Amy. Amy 
kept her trinkets and her best clothes there, 
but there was room for a great deal beside. 
No large space was required to hold all our 


152 


AMY CARR. 


Amy’s worldly goods, and the various holiday 
gifts she had received from year to year, which 
were here preserved with care, for the sake of 
the memories attached to each. These things, 
clothes, books, boxes and baskets, were all ar- 
ranged in order there, and in one corner sepa- 
rate from the rest was the box Amy called her 
savings bank. 

Looking at this relic and that, Maria finally 
took the savings bank in her hand. You have 
seen such a tin box, painted red, with a hole in 
the roof, where the money could be dropped in, 
and a trap-door underneath, with a tiny lock to 
it. And there in the corner lay the key, just 
where the box had stood. 

Maria was curious to know how much money 
Amy had in her bank ; and she turned the key 
in the lock, and the contents dropped into her 
hand. Copper, silver, gold, and a bank note. 

Maria was astonished. She looked at the 
note — three dollars! No wonder Amy, the 
miser! felt rich enough to make Christmas 
presents. How in the world had she managed 
to save all this money ? To be sure, Ml told. 


AMY CARR. 


153 


the sum amounted only to seven dollars ; and 
if she had been as prudent as Amy had been, 
Maria would by that time have laid up double 
that amount ; but it seemed to her as she looked 
at the money, it was no injustice to call Amy a 
miser. Who would have believed that she 
could have hoarded all this sum, and never -even 
mentioned it to her ! 

Here was enough to pay that hateful debt 
Maria owed to Stephen. This thought finally 
took hold of her and it would not let her go 
again. 

Where would be the harm if she borrowed 
this sum of three dollars of Amy, and paid Ste- 
phen without saying anything to Amy about 
it ? Of course as soon as she came home Amy 
must know. If she were only here now, Ma- 
ria would be glad ; but she was not here, and 
there was Stephen in the yard, and oh, to be 
rid of the hateful debt to him ! the debt that 
made her feel like a guilty coward whenever 
she saw the lad ! A few minutes of such reflec- 
tions, and Maria had opened the window and 
called to Stephen, who was chopping wood. 


154 


AMY CARR. 


“ Did you think you would never get your 
maney back ?” said she, when he came to the 
window. 

“ Why, no, indeed, said he, “ I never thought 
anything about it.’^ 

“ Well, here it is,” said she. “ You’re a good 
fellow, Steph. I’ll recommend you for a money- 
lender, if I hear of anybody in need. . . . Did 
you ever say anything about my having it ?” 

Maria hesitated before she asked this ques- 
tion. She was almost certain of the way Ste- 
phen would take it. 

. ‘ Say anything about it !” cried he, almost 
angrily. . “No, indeed. What for ? It’s only 
your business and mine.” 

“ Of course. I know you wouldn’t. I don’t 
know why I asked you. You’re very kind. 
I’m very much obliged to you. I musn’t stand 
here with this window open, though. Is your 
mother any better, Stephen ?” 

“ She’s just the same,” he answered. “ When 
are you going back to the shop, Maria ?” 

“ Next Monday, I hope, if I live. Maybe I’ll 
go to-morrow. I could, if they wanted me. 



“WKLL, HERK IT IS, SAID SHE.” 

Page 154 











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AMY CARR. 


155 


Oil, you don’t know how tired I am of doing 
nothing.” 

“ It’s kind o’ dull, I expect, down here in this 
lane, after the shop over yonder. I wouldn’t 
like it myself, day in and out.” 

“ No ; you wouldn’t, would you ?” 

“ But, then, it won’t hurt you to take a little 
breathing time,” said he. 

“ That’s well for you to say,” she answered, 
“ when you never take a day for enjoying your- 
self, like other folks.” 

“ I couldn’t afford to pay as high a price as 
some do for a day of pleasure,” was Stephen’s 
answer, as he walked off to the shed ; and 
Maria closed the window with a noise that 
made him smile. He took up his axe and went 
to work again. “ She might have stayed at 
home, then,” said he to himself. “ She might 
have helped Amy keep Christmas, with old 
Mr. Herbert.” 


156 


AMY CARR. 


XX. 

M onday morning came, and, according to 
her hope, it found Maria able to go back 
to her work. 

But she had said nothing to Amy about the 
money borrowed from the savings bank. 

It was her intention to tell Amy immediately 
on her return, but various things prevented 
her ; so that it slipped from her mind until 
bed-time came. Then, indeed, they were alone 
together, and nothing to hinder as full an ex- 
planation as Maria chose to make. But Amy 
was tired and sleepy. Maria said to herself, 
“ No use of exciting her by repeating all this 
story.” True, it was easily enough told. She 
had merely need to say that she chose to be in 
debt to Amy, rather than to Stephen ; and in 
a very few days she should have earned double 
the money. It was easy to go even further, 
and explain, that the clothes she had been 


AMY CARR. 


157 


obliged to furnish herself, in order to present 
a respectable appearance in the shop, had taken 
all her earnings ; and when the coat was 
talked about, she preferred to borrow the mo- 
ney of little Stephen, rather than of any of the 
hands in Miss Butler’s shop ; easy enough to 
tell these truths ; but Maria found it easier 
yet to keep silent in regard to all of them. So 
she kept silent. 

She chose now that Amy should make her own 
discovery of her loss. If it happened while 
she was at home, well and good, thought 
Maria. They would have a little fun over 
Amy’s fright. That would be a capital joke, 
indeed ! 

But it did not happen while she was at 
home. It nearly happened. Amy had a shil- 
ling in her pocket on Saturday evening, and 
this she transferred to the savings bank, and 
would have counted over the money for Maria’s 
edification, if it had not been so late ; and for 
the thought, beside, that Maria might suppose 
she was making some display of her riches. 
She hesitated over that thought for a moment, 
14 


\ 


158 


AMY CARR. 


and concluded it might be more generous to 
say nothing about it until Maria was able to go 
to work again. This was what saved Maria 
from the opportunity of making an explanation 
that Saturday evening. 

Now, Maria had occupied this bureau with 
Amy, and on Monday afternoon Amy was put- 
ting her special drawer in order again, when 
she opened the savings bank, and saw that it 
had been robbed. 

At first she could not believe her eyes it 
seemed incredible that the bank-note was gone, 
and she began to search for it. Of course we 
know that she must search in vain ; but she 
could not believe it. She looked everywhere, 
in probable and improbable places. You know 
how people go through such a search — ^how it 
would seem to her — she had seen that bank 
note everywhere, and left it everywhere ! and 
having looked everywhere, would begin the 
search over again. In this way she went on 
till it was necessary that she should be about 
some other work. 

She was sitting in the evening very discon- 


AMY CARR. 


159 


solately before the stove. She had been knit- 
ting, but the work had dropped from her 
hands. One of Mr. Herbert’s old friends was 
sitting with him. Herbert was reading the 
paper, while the neighbor smoked his pipe ; 
and Stephen, who had brought the newspaper, 
was now bringing in an armful of wood. He 
went off and brought it without explaining his 
intentions, or asking if he should : for Amy- 
looked so disturbed, he could not go away 
until he had an opportunity of speaking with 
her. 

When he had filled the wood-box, he came 
and stood by the stove. 

“ What’s the matter, Amy,” said he. 

“ Nothing,” she answered. 

“ Are you lonesome, because Maria is gone ?” 
he asked, for he was certain something was the 
matter, and she must not expect him to believe 
to the contrary, as long as she kept that coun- 
tenance. 

Amy, looking at Stephen, strove hard to say, 
in a quiet, natural way, 

“ It’s nothing, Stephen, really j” but she 


160 


AMY CARR. 


failed. She said it in such a way that he im- 
mediately was convinced that it was something 
very serious. 

“ You don^t look that way, Amy, when there^s 
nothing the matter,” said he. “ Maybe I can 
help you out of it. Shall I go somewhere for 
you ?” 

“I don’t want anything, thank you, Ste- 
phen,” said Amy ; and she hesitated about 
speaking further, but finally she said, “ I had 
some money I had laid aside, and I can’t find 
it. I’ve been looking, and looking.” 

“ I’ve often had that happen,” said Stephen, 
“ but it always turns up again, almost always, 
in some odd place, and then I remember that I 
put it there.” 

“ That’s what I said to myself : it would 
come to light ; but I can’t think it likely. I 
know where I put it, and it isn’t there. I know 
I haven’t ever taken it out again, for I should 
remember doing it. Besides, I haven’t had any 
need for it. I kept it in a little box.’ 

“ And is the box there, all right ?” 

“Yes, just where I’ve always kept it.” 


AMY CARR. 


161 


“ Haven^t you been buying something, and 
forgot 

“ No, I know I haven’t ; for I had enough 
money without taking that. I was going to 
keep it for something.” 

“ How much was it, Amy ?” 

“ Three dollars.” 

Stephen’s eyes flashed ; he looked astonished. 

“ A bill ?” he said, in his quick, eager way. 
“Ho! ho!” 

“ Yes ; it was a bill.” 

“Wouldn’t know it if you saw it again, 
would you ?” said he. 

“ Yes, I would ; for it was a new one, I re- 
member. I know what faces there were on it, 
and the picture. There was a river, and a fall 
in it?” 

“ Is that it ?” asked Stephen ; and he showed 
Amy the note Maria gave him. 

“ It’s just exactly like it,” said she. 

“Then it’s yours; and you’ve got it back 
again already, before you knew it, haven’t you ? 
Now you mustn’t look so solemn, will you, 
Amy ?” 

14 * 


\ 


162 


AMT CARR. 


A.my looked at him amazed. 

“ Don’t you ask me a single question,” said 
he. “ I won’t tell you where I got it. I can’t. 
But I’ll tell you that when I took it, I said to 
myself. I’ll keep that bill, for I thought I’d hear 
from it again ; and so you see I kept it. Don’t 
be afraid I’ll lose anything by that. I 
never felt as if it was mine. But I’ll have 
mine. So don’t you worry about me.” 


AMY CARR. 


163 


XXL 

T he next time Maria came home she heard 
all this story. Amy told it to her. It was 
a wonderful tale to Amy. Many were the 
questions Maria asked about it, as they talked 
together in the dark. Stephen, it seemed, from 
all she heard, had not betrayed her. 

Stephen saw Maria when she went home. 
He saw her, also, when she was on her way 
back to the shop, and he followed her. 

Walking on in his rapid way, at a half run, it 
was not long ere he had overtaken her. 

“Did Amy tell you about it said he, when 
he was walking by Maria’s side. 

Maria was angry at his boldness, and said, 
shortly, 

“What?” 

“About her loss.” 

“What’s that?” 

“ Why, of the money she lost. Three dol- 
lars, you know.” 


164 


AMY CARR. 


“ Yes, to be sure she did. She said she had 
missed them out of a box where she keeps her 
money. What of it ?” 

“ What do you think about it 

“Why, she mislaid it, of course, some- 
where.’’ 

“ No, she didn’t. Did she tell you I’d give 
her the money back ?” 

“ Yes,” said Maria, with reluctance, and with 
yet more of pride. 

“Well, you know, Maria, it was the same 
bill you gave me the other day.” 

“ How do I know it ?” 

“ How ? well enough, I guess.” 

“ You’ve given her back the money because 
you say it was hers — or she does — or some way 
you’ve managed it. Have I got to pay you 
over again ? I’d like to know.” 

“ What do you think about that ? I don’t 
wear blinders on my eyes. Do you want me 
to tell Amy I got that bill of you ?” 

“ I don’t care what you tell. But I dare say 
I ought to pay back double for every cent I 
have borrowed of any one.” 


AMY CARR. 


165 


Just as you like to put it/’ said Stephen. 
“ I don’t care.” 

“ W ell,” said she, “ I shall pay you, because 
I don’t want Amy to lose her money.” 

“ Thank you, Maria. But Amy isn’t a loser, 
you know. She’s got her money back. As for 
me — Avhenever you are ready. I’m in no hurry 
for the money. Mind that.” 

But Maria said, 

“ ’Twill be paid the first minute I can get 
the money. You may be sure of that.” 

And so Stephen left her, and Maria went 
her way to the shop alone. 

And he, the little lad she despised so much, 
he might, if he chose — indeed, how could he 
help it ? — he might think of her as a thief ? 
Why should he not ? had she not proved to be 
one? 

For it was now much too late to go back 
and say what was true the other day, that she 
had only borrowed the money of Amy. 

She did but borrow it at the first, though 
without permission. 

You see how by one misstep and another she 


166 


AMY C A R R J 


had come to occupy this miserable position ; 
how though she had not intended to be a thief, 
she actually stood in the place of one ; and to 
all intents was one. 

And because Stephen Eider knew this hate- 
ful business through and through, and she could 
not condescend to explain it to the boy, she 
hated him. And because she was afraid, yes, 
actually afraid of meeting him, she now came 
home as seldom as possible. 

AVork pressed in the shop ; it was easy to 
say that. All the hands were busy ; and this 
was really true. She must make up by dili- 
gence and attention for the time she had lost. 
There was certainly need enough that she 
should be earning wages. All these things she 
said to Amy by way of explanation ; and Amy 
must yield to Marians necessity. And Mr. 
Herbert understood it, at least he thought he 
did. “ ’Tend to business first, child,” he would 
say ; “ do your duty by Miss Butler. Amy and 
I are getting on first-rate. We mustn’t disap- 
point those that employ us ; we must come up 
to their expectations or quit the service.” 


AMY CARR. 


167 


But did these words make Maria feel less 
like a slave ? She had really in these days no 
liberty. Afraid of Stephen Eider ! You would 
not have seen anything so very terrible in him 
had you but looked at poor little Stephen. 
But the Eye of Truth in the head of the merest 
child may well be a terror to the strongest 
false heart that beats. 


168 


AJVIY CARR. 


XXIL 


NE evening Stq)hen Rider ran up Miss 



Vy Butler’s steps, threw open her shop door, 
and stood in the glare of the gas-light looking 
about him, not in the least dismayed, but evi- 
dently searching with his eager eyes for some- 
body whom he had expd^ted to see the moment 
he opened the door. 

A 5^oung girl who was waiting in the shop 
came forward, and asked him what he wanted, 
in a way that seemed intended to remind him 
that he had better be off, for evidently he had 
got into the wrong place by mistake. Indeed, 
it did not seem likely tliat Stephen could have 
any business to transact there. 

Stephen was too hurried and too anxious to 
lieed or to hear the way the little girl spoke to 
him ; he said. 


“ I want Maria Twist. Don’t she work hero ? 
Isn’t she in ?” 


AMY CARR. 


169 


“ Jenny, call Maria,” said the young lady, and 
she went back to the counter and looked at 
some work she had there unfinished. 

When Maria came in she called to her, and 
said, 

“ There’s something down by the door that 
has asked for you. Don’t be frightened ; I 
guess it is a boy ; though he looks more like a 
scarecrow.” 

“Why, it’s Stephen!” exdaimed Maria, as 
she went towards the door. 

He stood with his hands plunged in his pock- 
ets, looking around him with the eyes of a man 
accustomed to take note, in the most rapid 
manner, of everything he sees. The surprise 
and perplexity of the lad as his thoughts be- 
came entangled in the midst of those bright 
colors and soft textures, displayed in the show- 
cases and along the counter, and on the various 
tables, passed away, dispelled as by a breath, 
when he saw Maria standing before him. 

“ Hurry 1” he exclaimed. 

“ What do you want ?” said she. She thought 
that he wanted his money ; that in some sudden 
15 


170 


AMY GARB. 


strait he had run in there, and she must not 
keep him waiting. It was to be expected that 
he would do anything, the first thing that hap- 
pened to come into his mind at the moment he 
needed the money. 

He looked at her when she asked him that 
way. What he wanted, for one instant looked 
as if he were astonished, then he said, 

“ Amy has come home sick. They brought 
her in a hack. Mr. Herbert wants you to come 
right away. I got a doctor ; and he’s 
there.” 

That was all he said. Having delivered his 
message, he turned about and was gone. There 
was no time to ask a question. He did not 
intend that she should lose a moment in that 
way; 

Money ! it was clear enough that her money 
was the last thing Stephen thought of at that 
momenf. 

Maria went home. No matter what risk she 
ran, what time she lost, what money she lost, 
she must go home. Her work must wait, or 
other hands in the shop there must perform it. 


AMY CARR. 


171 


An hoiK had come to her that comes in turn to 
all, when the business most urgent must be 
thrust aside, when the service she liked must 
be forsaken, when the risks of loss, must not for 
a moment be thought of ; there might be occu- 
pation and call for her in the work-room, in 
the show-room, here and there ; but in another 
place there was such a need of her, such a ne- 
cessity, as made every other claim whatever 
seem useless and idle. 

For when Love calls, though it be out of a 
silent and darkened room in a little brown cot- 
tage down the lane, and with a voice ever so 
feeble, the great people of the world must stand 
aside ; they must make room for her who is 
summoned to run from their service ; they must 
not hinder her whatever their necessity may be. 

So Maria is at home again. 

It is no time now for complaint. And she 
utters none. It is hardly a time for action ; 
but a time for watching and waiting ; for none 
can foretell the issue of this fever ; quiet must 
be maintained in the house ; and rarely you 
hear a sound except the ticking of the clock. 


172 


AMY CARR. 


or the light step that waits on Grandfather 
Herbert. 

This sickness of Amy’s, a nervous fever, 
brought on, the doctor said, by over work and 
anxiety, continued long ; and during its contin- 
uance there were days when those who watched 
the child looked from hour to hour for the last 
words she should speak, the last look that 
should fall upon them from her dying eyes. 
Do you know how they watched and waited ? 

Stephen’s mother came into the house and 
served them as a servant in those days. 

There was no rest for Stephen while this 
house of his friend was in distress. People 
missed him in many places he was accustomed 
to frequent day after day ; his most important 
duties at the various stations were performed, 
but the smaller matters, which in ordinary 
seasons he never neglected, were neglected 
now. Amy is dying ; this was the distressing 
thought he carried with him everywhere ; and 
many were the secret tears he shed on her ac- 


AMY CARR. 


173 


count ; many were the prayers he offered in her 
behalf. All her kind words and acts were be- 
fore him ; they were written out in such letters 
as shone before his eyes ; he never could forget 
them. He did not know quite what a sister 
was, but he said to himself Amy came nearest 
to what he thought a sister might be of any- 
thing he had known. 

He made himself very helpful about the 
house in these days. If you could have seen 
him with Mr. Herbert, waiting on him, you 
might have thought that neither of them suffer- 
ed much anxiety ; they only assumed that cheer- 
fulness, because they deemed it their duty to 
assume it. 

Miss Dix was often at the house. There had 
grown in the woman’s heart the tenderest love 
for Amy ; to hear her talk of the child was 
enough to bring tears to Mr. Herbert’s eyes, 
and to abase the spirit of Maria to the dust. 

“If God should take her to himself,” Miss 
Dix would say, “ we might well praise Him for 
his tender love. For it would be taking our 
darling away from earth to Heaven. It seems 


174 


AMY CAKE. 


to me I can think more easily of Amy among 
the blesssed ones of Heaven, than of any person 
I have ever known. Blessed are the pure in 
heart for they shall see God. She already walks 
in white.” 

Many a night she sat by Amy’s bed watching 
till the day broke. She said she could not 
sleep if she should go home, so anxious was 
she to know how Amy fared from hour to 
hour. 

Sometimes at night a voice might have been 
lieard singing in the sick child’s room. It was 
Miss Dix singing in the lowest strain, the soft- 
est voice that ever bore song to Heaven. 

What words were they she sang ? Now it 
was : 


“ Tlie Shepherd sought his sheep, 

The Father sought his child ; 

They followed me o’er vale and hill, 
O’er deserts waste and wild : 

They found me nigh to death, 
Famished, and faint, and lone. 

They bound me with the bands of love, 
They saved the wandering one !” 


AMY CARR. 


175 


And again : 

“ Where’er I go I’ll tell the story _ 

Of the Cross, of the Cross ; 

In nothing else shall be my glory, 

Save the Cross, save the Cross. 

Y^es, this my constant theme shall be, 
Through time and in eternity. 

That Jesus suffered death for me 
On the Cross, on the Cross.” 

Or yet again : 

“ Let sorrow’s rudest tempest blow, 

Each chord on earth to sever. 

Our King says ‘ Come,’ and there’s our Home 
Forever ! oh, forever !” 

But oftener than all, and above all, that song 
sung round the world by Christian hearts, in 
living and in dying : 

“ Rock of Ages ! cleft for me 1” 

Miss Dix could hardly know all she did when 
she sang these songs for Amy, one after an- 
other, sometimes by the hour. What did she ? 
No more than you may do who sing the songs 


176 


AMY CARE. 


of Zion, not as exiles, but as in your native land, 
with harps that were never hung on the willows 
of Babylon. Songs of triumph and of Christian 
rejoicing, sing them as you go ! The Lord^s 
songs in all lands ! For, as Maria heard this 
singing, her soul trembled towards prayer. 
And you, chanting his praise, may even thus be 
about your Father’s business ! 

One evening in the early spring, while the 
busy robins were chirping to and fro among 
the great elm branches, making their arrange- 
ments for the summer (who that heard could 
doubt ?), Mr. Herbert, Miss Dix, and Maria, sat 
in Amy’s room. Amy, they supposed, was sleep- 
ing ; but suddenly she looked up and said, ad- 
dressing Miss Dix, though she noticed with a 
smile that they all were there, 

“Do you remember that picture in the Reader 
we were folding last ?” 

“ Which picture, dear ?” 

“The one of the great storm and shipwreck.” 

Miss Dix could not recall it. 

“You put it aside,” said Amy ; “printed so 
badly, torn too I” 


AMY CAEE. 


177 


“ Yes.’^ Miss Dix remembered now that there 
was such a sheet. 

“ I cut out that picture, Miss Dix, the one 
of the storm ; do you care ? 

“ Dear child, no I I am glad you took it, 
if you wanted it, for the sheet was good for 
nothing but waste paper.’^ 

“ I^m so glad you say so. I thought after- 
wards, since I have been sick, perhaps I ought 
not to have taken it. I put it in the hymn- 
book Maria gave me. Maria, will you get it 
for Miss Dix 

How do you suppose Maria felt when she 
heard poor Amy confessing so slight a thing as 
this, and looking so relieved when she had told 
it? 

She, at least, understood why Amy had spoken 
as she did ; and when she gave the hymn-book 
to Miss Dix, it was in her heart to fall down 
in the presence of them all, and own how heavy 
was the burden she carried hidden from their 
sight and their suspicion. 

Miss Dix soon found the picture. It was 
merely a little vignette, which, in turning the 


178 


AMY CARR. 


leaves of a book, a great many persons would • 
pass by with merely a glance ; but, you see, it 
had made an impression upon Amy — indeed it 
had fairly haunted her— as sometimes the frag- 
ment of a song will do, years after you have 
heard it sung ; as sometimes the fragrance of a 
flower will do, long after the flower itself has 
mouldered into dust ; as sometimes the look 
of a friend, when the eyes of that friend have 
long been closed in the darkness of the grave. 

“Do you see the birds. Miss Dix?” asked 
Amy. 

“ Yes, dear, they are flying low ; it is a dread- 
ful storm.” 

“ And there’s a sailor overboard clinging to 
the rope. Will he be saved ?” 

“The rope looks like a thread that might 
snap any moment in the gale,” said Miss Dix. 
“ Perhaps it is enough to save a life by, though.” 

“ I had a queer dream about it,” said Amy. 
“ I thought I saw the storm, and there was a 
passenger carried off the deck by the gale — it 
wasn’t long after that that the ship began to 
settle — then I thought the passenger must be 


AMY CARR. 


179 


lost. There was only one I thought. But, by 
and by, as I watched, I could hear the waves — 
it was just like the roar of cannon — I saw that 
in the direction the man was carried by the 
waves there was a rock right in the very midst 
of the sea, and a tower on top of it, and the 
tower, perhaps it was a lighthouse, had arms 
like a cross ; and, at last, the poor fellow was 
thrown upon the rock by a great wave and 
saved.'^ 

When Amy ceased speaking, Maria said to 
herself, “ I’m out in such a storm, but I shall be 
drowned, I guess. I don’t see any rock.” 

And, just then. Miss Dix sang in her low, 
sweet voice : 

Eock of Ages cleft for me I” 

And when she had finished, Mr. Herbert said : 

“ Yes, yes ; that’s so. That was a good 
dream for us all to remember, Amy. It is a 
great dream for us to remember, Maria.” 

But Maria made answer secretly : 

“ He doesn’t see me, or care, I’m alone.” 
And she said this to herself, over and over 


180 


AMY CARR. 


again she said it, in a helpless, hopeless kind 
of way. Until in the silence that fell upon 
them all, the death-like silence of the room, for 
Amy was now sleeping, her heart and soul 
suddenly stood up, though she herself sat there 
so motionless, they stood up and looked as it 
were through a storm, in wild dismay and fear^ 
and she cried out, “ Lord, save or I perish 
It was a cry that never had escaped her 
heart before. A need she had never under- 
stood before, as now she understood it, was 
upon her, and from herself, whom now she 
feared, she saw that the Lord alone could save 
her. Drifting along wherever the waves car- 
ried her, dashed, torn, breathless, where was 
the rock of salvation ? She saw it not ; she 
could only cry, “ Save, Lord, or I perish 
What other cry than this could the heart of 
Maria fashion or her lips utter ? She cried 
to Him with whom alone is salvation. She 
was asking deliverance. And would He not 
open a way of escape ! But in which direction 
would it lead ? Be sure not the way of pride ; 
be sure not in the way she had been drifting. 


AMY CARR. 


181 


The sinner must pay the penalty of his sin, 
and Maria, could not escape it. Her penalty 
here was to pay the price of pride and vanity, 
and confess her folly. 

It was the hardest thing that could be asked 
of her. Yet, in the watches of that night, when 
Amy’s life was hanging still as by a thread, 
she did not count the cost of salvation. She 
was ready to pay the price I 

Oh, Master, to pay the price I 

All night Maria was saying to herself : 

“ If Amy lives till to-morrow, she shall know 
about the money.” . . . And to God, she said, 
“If Thou wilt save her life, 0 Lord, I will 
confess my sin.” 

And when, in the morning, the doctor said to 
Mr. Herbert, “ the fever is broken, there is 
nothing now to fear ; good nursing will bring 
the little one about in a very short time ; na- 
ture has the work to do ; ” Maria did not 
forget the midnight vow 
16 


182 


AMY CARR. 


XXIIL 

O NE day, during Amy’s recovery, Maria was^ 
sitting beside her bed, and Amy held her 
hand. 

Nothing had been said yet about the neces- 
sity there was of going back to Miss Butler, or 
the danger there might be of losing her situa- 
tion by this long absence. Maria, in these 
days, seemed to have no care but for Amy’s 
comfort ; there was never a more faithful nurse 
than she had proved to be during this long 
sickness. She seemed to have had no thought 
of herself ; and in this labor of love she had 
found an exceeding great reward. 

Amy had been thinking a great deal about 
this kindness of Maria, and now she said : 

“ I didn’t think you loved me so w^ell, and 
I’m sure, Maria, I never knew that I loved you 
so well. It won’t ever be again as it was 
once with us. What is the reason, I wonder ?” 


AMY CAER. 


183 


’ “ Because/’ said Maria, “ it was all my fault 
before. I don’t think I knew you. I don’t 
know what was the matter with me, either. If 
you hadn’t lived, Amy, there are a good many 
things I never could have forgiven myself for.” 

“I feel exactly so,” said Amy. “We were 
both to blame. We couldn’t bear to give up 
. . . but if we do give up to Jesus, it’s easy 
enough to give up to each other.” 

“ Yes,” said Maria, in such a way that Amy 
knew she perfectly agreed with her — not be- 
cause Amy was feeble — and it would not be 
safe now to dispute with her ; but because 
Maria believed in her heart with her. 

“ Yes,” she said, and that was all. It was 
enough. 

“ You don’t know what curious things I’ve 
thought of since I have been lying here,” said 
Am y, “ and how much I’ve thought about you, 
when I had my eyes shut, and you thought, I 
dare say, that I was asleep. I wondered whe- 
ther you would miss me much, when I was 
carried out of here, and put away, for I thought I 
should not live. I thought you must be sorry for 


184 


AMY CAER. 


awhile, but, perhaps, not very long. It grieved 
me so to think of you and father here alone. 
I shall try and make it a great deal pleasanter 
for you and him, when I am about again.” 

“ You always made it pleasant !” said Maria, 
speaking very fast, and (tears were dropping 
from her eyes. “ Pleasanter than I did I I 
was always thinking how Pd like to have 
things for my own comfort, but you were 
always thinking about grandfather . . Amy — ” 

Maria’s voice shook so when she pronounced 
Amy’s name, that she could go no further. A 
moment ago she thought, “ I must tell her all, 
now or never I” Yet she had stumbled, even 
at the threshold of Amy’s heart, and was ready 
to fall down speechless. 

When Amy looked at her, she knew that 
Maria had yet something more to say, atid she 
held her hand in a firmer clasp, as if to cheer 
and strengthen her, and she said, “ Dear 
Maria 

Maria turned and looked at her, as though, 
for a moment, she supposed that this might be 
a call ; but Amy only smiled. There was 


AMY CAER. 


185 


nothing to ask for ; she was content to lie there, 
with Maria so near her, and so loving. 

The sight of that pale face, the pressure of 
that wasted hand, reminded Maria that she 
must control herself if she would talk with 
Amy ; and so, now, making a great effort to 
speak with composure, she said : 

“ Amy, IVe got something to tell you, and I 
don^t know how I shall ever get through with it.’^ 

“ Don’t you 1” said Amy, “ then wait till some 
other time, Maria.” 

“ No ; now or never !” answered Maria, 
speaking up with decision. “ Oh, Amy, when 
I heard you talking about the picture, and your 
dream, I thought there was no danger that you 
would ever be shipwrecked ; but I, Fm out in 
the storm, and though I do see the Rock, if I 
don’t tell you everything now . . . the waves 
run so high ! — ” 

Her voice broke — she hid her face in the 
bed-clothes, and it was indeed a storm that 
shook poor Maria’s soul. 

Above its roar was heard dear Amy’s voice, 
whispering softly : 

16* 


186 


AMY CAHR. 


“ Those waves could never break over the 
Rock, though they might hide it from your eyes 
awhile, Maria. 

“ But not forever — ^not forever 
“ All in a moment you might find your feet 
were set firm on the Rock itself. It is such an 
easy thing for Christ to work miracles.^^ 

“ Oh, then, it would be a miracle to find my- 
self under that tower. It^s the only safe place 
in the ocean, and I know it — Amy, I know it — 
and I want to be there ! ” 

“Maria, then you shall be! He will not 
leave you comfortless. He will come to you ; 
he came to Peter when he was drowning ; He 
saved him How strong the voice of Amy 
sounded now. Well might it. It was strong 
with the strength of him who leans on the staff 
and is comforted, while he goes through the 
dark valley ; the strength of him who di-inks 
of the living fountain in the desert, and is 
saved from perishing ; the strength of him 
who, wounded nigh to death, looks up at the 
brazen serpent and is alive again. The valiant 
and conquering strength of him, who, beset by 


AMY CARR. 


187 


legions of foes, standing alone and defenceless, 
, looks down on his tormentors and exclaims : 

“ I will say of the Lord, He is my fortress, 
my defence, and my high tower 

“ I was going to tell you something,^^ began 
Maria again, speaking now more quietly, as if 
nothing should hinder her from telling the tale 
through to the end, “ about that money you 
lost, Amy ! Did you think that I knew any- 
thing more about it than I seemed to ?’* 

“ You, dear Maria ? No.’’ 

“ I did, Amy.” 

“ Did you, Maria ? Oh — yes — you dis- 
covered it in some way ; that is not so very 
strange.” 

“ Discovered it I I should think so. But, 
believe me, Amy, at first I only borrowed it, 
and I expected you would know it right away. 
I was going to tell you as soon as you came 
home — it was while I had the influenza — but 
something happened that I couldn’t — and then 
I thought, never mind — I would scare you a 
little ; besides, I was ashamed, for I borrowed 
the money of Stephen to get grandfather’s 


188 


AMY CARR. 


Christmas present, and I was so proud, I hated 
you should know it, and hated to be in debt, 
too. Then I got mad at him, and you, and 
everybody ; for he was looking at me as if I 
was a thief — and I wasn^t much better — I donT 
suppose I was a bit better — not a single bit — 
oh, Amy Carr, if you only knew — 

Maria could not speak another word. She fell 
on her knees — she turned her face from Amy 
— she had told all, and now it seemed to her 
that she could never look in Amy’s face again. 

“ Dear Maria !” said Amy, at length, and she 
kissed the hand she held, and stroked Maria’s 
head, and for a little while she said no more. 

It grew so very still, so aiufuUy silent, in 
the room, that at length Maria cotfld endure it 
no longer, and she sprang to her feet. What 
if this story she had told had killed Amy ? for 
there Amy lay, with her eyes closed and pale 
indeed as death. 

“ Amy !” she exclaimed, terrified. The call 
brought Amy back, not from unconsciousness, 
but from prayer ; she looked up at Maria and 
smiled j she said, “ Kiss me, dear Maria.” 


AMT CARR. 


189 


That word brought Maria to her knees again. 
“ I shall never get up/^ she said, “ never, from 
this place, till you tell me you forgive me. Do 
you, Amy? Do you Amy? such a wicked, 
shameless thing ? 

What was Amy^s answer? Was there not 
something really Christ-like in it 1” 

“ Maria, I never seemed to love you half as 
much a I do now. Kiss me, dear Maria 
And then Maria kissed her, and said, 

“ Oh, Amy, I have had my fortune told for 
me again !” And she sat down close by Amy^s 
side. 

“ Blessed are they that mourn , was Amy’s 
answer, “/or they^^hall be comforted . . . Blessed 
are they that do hunger and thirst after right- 
eousness, for they shod he filled 


190 


AMY CARR. 


XXIV. 

T here was a glad surprise in store for Ste- 
phen Rider the next time he came into the 
kitchen. He was now in the habit of coming 
twice or thrice every day to inquire after Amy, 
and whether there were any errands to be 
done. 

Maria was the one to see him and give him 
the intelligence he wanted ; and we all know 
how she gave it ; we have heard people telling 
such good tidings to each other of the dear ones 
who have been given back to them from the 
borders of the grave. 

Maria said, “ The danger is all over, Stephen, 
she is getting better every hour. She has been 
asking about you, Stephen.’^ 

Stephen's face, which had looked very anx- 
ious and careworn until this uioment, in spite 
of all that had beem told him about the fever 


AMY CARE. 


191 


being broken, now brightened to such a degree 
Maria knew how lightened his heart was. 
There was no time like the present, she saw, 
for telling him that she had been speaking to 
Amy about the missing bank note. 

The report she gave amazed him. He made 
no concealment of his amazement. 

“ Why, Maria,” said he, “ did you really go 
and tell her ?” and he spoke with so much doubt 
that Marias face grew red. 

“ I did,” she answered, trying to check the 
anger and pride she felt. “Time, wasn’t it, 
Stephen ? High time, I should think.” 

“ Time enough, maybe. But all things don’t 
get done in time,” said he. 

“ It wouldn’t have been very wise to put this 
off to eternity,” said she. 

“ That’s so, . . . it wouldn’t. . . . But Maria !” 
he looked at her with serious wonder, “ I really 
didn’t see how you were going to get out of 
it. When you paid me the money I thought 
that was the end of the business.” 

Maria’s impulse when he said this was to 
turn about and go away. But as she looked 


192 


AMY CARR. 


at Stephen’s honest, earnest, friendly face, 
another feeling arose to prevent that. And 
she said, 

“d never should, Steph, never, if I hadn’t 
been out in such a storm . . and got nearly 

shipwrecked — and found there was the Rock 
of Ages for Salvation I There’s my fortune 
toldl” 

She had made her confession ! She had given 
to God the glory of her deliverance. What 
now did he say in reply to it ? 

“Maria, I know what that means. We’re 
all ‘ out on the ocean sailing,’ bound for ‘ the 
Rock that is higher ’ than the storms can blow. 
And we don’t want any old impostors to proph- 
esy their lies to us. We’ve got God’s Word 
for it that the fear of Him is the beginning of 
wisdom ; and, if we commit our way to Him, 
He will bring it to pass.” 

“ Stephen, you did mean that time that you’d 
taken the Bible for your fortune-teller, didn’t 
you ? I know you did.” 

“ Yes ! ” he answered. And the boy’s head 
lifted, when he spoke, with a noble courage. 


AMY CARR. 


193 


and a strange look, that was grander than any 
“ high look,’^ you ever saw, of pride. “ Yes ! I 
don’t care who knows it now. I kept that to 
myself for a good while. But when I found 
out that He wanted me to work in the field. 
His field you know, I just stepped along into it. 
I said to myself. If Amy could be spared to Mr. 
Herbert, I’d come out and make my stand. 
But as I was saying that to myself pretty often, 
it came into my head one day, what right had I 
to be making my terms with the Almighty ! 
He was the one to make them with me. Amy 
belonged to Him, and He had a right to do 
anything with her He chose. But as for me, I 
hadn’t a. right to do anything but obey Him. 
So I spoke to the old gentleman, that’s my 
friend, Mr. Spingler, and he said I was right ; 
so I’ve come out and took my stand. And they 
read my name in the church last Sunday ; and 
I’m going to be a member.” 

So Stephen Bider made his confession. 

And now what more is to be said ? What 
need is there that you and I should follow any 
longer the fortunes of our friends ? 

17 


194 


AMY CARR. 


They stand on the Rock of Ages. Each and 
every one of them. 

Can anything really harm them ? He hath 
said, “ I will never leave thee nor forsake thee f 
said it to souls that looked to Him, as all these 
were looking to Him. Turning to each other 
they might ask, “ Since God is for us, who can 
be against us?” The Eternal God was their 
refuge ; and underneath them his everlasting 
arms. 

But shall they never more know tribulation 
in this world ? Yes, they shall have their tri- 
als : they know they must endure them as good 
soldiers ; or how obtain the promises ? 

Amy and Maria must work for their bread ; 
they must earn it through weariness. That is 
their allotment. But their Help, think of it ! 
is in the name of the Lord. 

If Stephen Rider should grow idle, and care- 
less, and vicious, he would quickly find his way 
into the house of correction ; nothing would 
prevent it ; but he will not grow idle, or care- 
less, or vicious. He has formed other habits ; 
he has a zeal, and courage, and a noble ambi- 


AMY CARR. 


195 


tion to satisfy, such as never yet brought man 
to poverty and shame. 

Mr. Herbert, be he ever so patient and re- 
signed, and prayerful, must remain a cripple to 
the last day of his life. A miracle alone could 
set him on his feet again. He does not hope 
for a miracle. Yet his hope is never at the 
low ebb we found it in the beginning of the 
days of which this story makes a record. He 
can join with Christians in their thankful 
hymns ; he can share with them in their works 
of prayer and praise. And so, “his days go 
on.” But are you curious to know a little more 
about these “ days” ? And about the “ plan” 
Mr. Spingler, all honor to his memory ! had 
formed for Stephen Rider ? 

The plan for Stephen took Mr. Herbert also 
into consideration. 

And if some day you cross the Park, and 
look into one of the windows on the north-east 
corner, perhaps you will see a man, not an old 
man either, though his hair is gray, who sits in 
a great chair that moves about on rollers ; he 
is busy selling books and papers there ; while 


196 


AMY CARR. 


a young man behind the counter, the image of 
Stephen Rider, waits on the customers who 
throng the shop! There you shall see the 
working out of Mr. Spingler^s “plan.” And 
if you had the time to linger about there for 
an hour, you might learn to your perfect satis- 
faction whether these partners in business get 
on happily together. 


THE MISSIONAEY’S 


CHRISTMAS -BOX. 



THE 



T IZZIE, don^t you think ifs tiresome, 
_LJ being disciplined all the while so? I 
do.” 

This question was asked in an undertone, 
and intended for Lizzie^s ear alone. But, 
though she stood so close behind her brother 
she could not possibly have failed to hear him, 
she made no answer, but continued merely to 
gaze through the window. Was she really 
looking at the woods, or did her thoughts fall 
short of the great forest, and the world that 
lay beyond it? was she recalling how last 
summer the little garden blossomed and bore 
fruit abundantly, and longing for the return 
of spring? She was thinking of things that 
at least she would not speak of. You see how 
blue and bright her eyes are — they are very 

( 199 ) 


200 


THE MISSIONARY'S 


far-seeing, even piercing eyes ; you would not 
hope to deceive her — you would not like to 
encounter her displeasure — yet they are tender 
eyes. She is a brave girl, who will sooner give 
than ask for quarter in the battle of life. 

“ I wish,” said Charley, who had not acquired 
his sister’s wisdom of silence, “ I wish, do you 
hear? that I’d been born a reg’lar Indian 
pony. Not papa’s, though, for that’s got to be 
about as poor as we are. But a reg’lar-built, 
strong one, I mean. Like what pony was 
before he had the bad luck to fall into the 
hands of a missionary. ... I tell you what, 
Lizzie, I’d make good use of my wind while it 
lasted.” 

“Then you’d get blown, and have to stop 
somewhere. Most likely just where the pasture 
was poorest. Unless horses fare differently 
from other folks. I’d like to be a bird, and 
go, I don’t know how many thousands of miles 
away from this I ” 

But when she had spoken thus, the girl 
looked quickly around her, as if fearful that 
somebody beside Charley had heard her foolish 


CHEISTMAS-BOX. 


201 


wish. She deserved to be rebuked, and she 
knew it, — that was the secret of the great heat 
into which she was suddenly thrown. Never 
doubt that she was heartily ashamed of the 
weakness betrayed by her exclamation, and 
vexed by the manner in which her brother 
caught at the token. 

“ Then you'd be sure to get shot about the 
time you'd like to stop and build a nest," said 
he laughing. 

She answered as if she would not easily for- 
give herself : 

“If I should really and truly go away to 
school, though I don't believe it will ever come 
to pass, and I should hope it wouldn't, except 
for mamma, she is so anxious about it. I'll write 
you a letter every single week. And if you 
were a pony you couldn't read, you know. So 
dont wish that again." 

“ And if you were a bird you couldn't write. 
So there we're even, Lizzie." 

She smiled, but the smile passed away quick- 
ly, and her voice sunk almost to a whisper as 
she said. 


202 


THE MISSIONAEY^S 


“ And we couldn’t either of us wonder what 
Joe can be about, gone all this while I And 
io-morrow will be Christmas! Did you tell 
mamma what Mr. Nichols said ? What did he 
say?” 

“ Why, I told you. He saw Joe swim out 
with his coat on his arm, and shouting to the 
lumbermen, when they went down the river on 
the raft. I know he has wanted to go to Clifton 
this great while. I wish I could go too.” 

“ To that hateful, ugly little place ! I don’t ! 
I wonder at Joe. I wonder that he didn’t ask, 
or say something about it. But it was such a 
pleasant morning, I expect, and he thought 
there wouldn’t be another very soon. True 
enough, there hasn’t.” 

As Lizzie said this she looked at Charley 
with anxious, steady eyes. Other words than 
she spoke were on her lips, yet they had no 
sound. Other thoughts were in her heart than 
she dared to utter. She saw that the fears 
and suspicions which had lodged in her own 
heart found no place in his, and she forebore to 
utter them. 


CHRISTMAS-BOX. 


203 




“ Lizzie/^ said he, “ tell me about that time 
when Santa Claus stopped at our house, and 
brought mamma the new dress and cap. Mer- 
cy ! don’t you wish he’d do it over again ? 
What was the rest of it ? ” 

“ Oh, Charley, you know as well as I do. 
You’ve heard about it often enough. . . Those 
books for papa ! And a new coat, and a hat, 
and shirts. Oh, I can’t remember half; We 
thought we should never get at the bottom of 
the box — but we did.” 

“ Do you suppose the folks are all dead that 
used to care about missionaries ? ” 

“No.” 

“ Why don’t we ever get another box, then?” 
“Because papa hasn’t asked anybody for 
one, I suppose.” 

A long pause followed this conversation. 
Lizzie’s thoughts went wandering again away 
off from this home in the wilderness, through 
secret paths, where Charley could not follow. 
At last — 

“ Lizzie.” 

“ Well.” 


204 


THE MISSIONARY'S 


“ Do you suppose a box would ever get to us 
now if it was started? Wouldn't the rebels 
get hold of it ? If they did, and knew about 
us, we wouldn't be likely to see anythiug 
of it." 

“ I guess not." 

“ Oh, if Santa Claus should get killed in the 
war, how sorry — " 

“ Charley ! what a silly boy you are." 
Cliarley laughed, but he said, 

“ I wish somebody knew how much I want 
to see Santa Claus. Mamma has been telling 
me about the trees, Christmas trees, they used 
to have in the Sunday-school in Bytown — ^liow 
they tied presents to the branches with every- 
body's name, and hung candles, all lighted, 
about — how splendid ! " 

“ Yes — I know — beautiful, of course . . . But 
then .... How I do wish papa would come I 
Let's run up to the bridge and see if he isn't 
coming. It will be dark pretty soon." 

But just then came a sharp, quick call for 
“ Charley," from the yard, and forthwith the 
liouse door flew open, and out went the minis- 


CHRISTMAS-BOX. 


205 


ter’s wife, his son, and his daughter, every one 
of them crying, “ What is it ? ” 

A deep, grave voice, perfectly familiar to 
all of them, and most dear to every one of them, 
answered, 

“ The pony is stuck fast in the bridge. You 
must come and help him out. . . . Charley. . . . 
I^m afraid . . . has Joseph come back yet ? ” 

“ No ; but weVe heard of him — that he got 
onto the raft that was going down to Clifton. 
Mr. Nichols saw him.” 

It was the minister's wife who answered. 
Charley was running for his cap. Lizzie stood 
dumb. 

The flood, she deemed, was rising to a height 
that would carry them all away. 

What was that fear her father would not 
name to them ? “ I^m afraid,” he began to say ; 
— what was he afraid of?- He who never 
could be daunted by any trouble, or distress, or 
cruelty, — what was he afraid of ? Why should 
he spare them ? Could not they bear any evil 
that was put on him ? 

Only for a moment did Elizabeth Greenfield 
18 


206 THE MISSIONARY'S 

stand thinking these thoughts. Then she went 
into the house and lighted a lantern, wrapped 
herself up in her old shawl, and followed her 
father and her brother. 

“That’s right, Lizzie,” said her mother, and 
she went back into the house to prepare the 
supper her husband must surely need by this 
time. It was Christmas Eve — ^he should have 
the best his house afforded ! 

So she went about her work with eager 
hands, and a quick step — for she was a woman 
who always put the best face possible on every 
business she had charge of. 

You may come into this house — this parson- 
age in the western wilderness — will it please 
you? You are welcome here. It is a log 
cabin, you perceive, consisting of two rooms 
and a loft. You ascend to the loft by a ladder. 
The window through which Lizzie and Charley 
were looking a little while ago, is one of the 
three of which the house can boast. Oh, if 
you could know at what a cost these windows 
were procured — ^how long the family waited 
for them — how they rejoiced over them when 


CHEISTMAS-BOX. 


207 


at last they saw them fixed in their proper 
places ! Then the door through which just now 
the missionary’s wife and children passed, 
there’s not another one beside it in the house ! 
You could never guess the price that they had 
paid for that single door. 

Well, but there are some treasures within 
here — some signs of comfort we see inside 
these walls. Yes, truly. The table on which 
the supper will be spread, was brought from 
Home. Other garniture it had in other days — 
and what different feasting! The bedstead 
likewise, and the cradle ; these things were 
brought out of the Holy Land of Memory, from 
the dear old house in the pleasant village far 
away. Thence, also, came the clock, and the 
candlesticks, and the most precious portion of 
the books you see on the corner shelf. Like- 
wise those little black-framed portraits of good 
men on the wall. They were wedding-gifts to 
the wife of Parson Greenfield. 

The rest of the furniture needs no explana- 
tion. It has evidently been made by the mis- 
sionary himself, to supply some urgent house- 


208 


THE MISSIONARY'S 


hold want. Parson Greenfield boasts of his 
carpentry sometimes. 

To this place, called St. Cloud, the mission- 
ary and his wife came when Joseph was three 
years old. Elizabeth was baptized in the old 
church of Bytown. On that most sacred day the 
mother saw around her kind and tender faces, 
familiar to her since she could remember ; and 
they were faces on which she had never looked 
again since her daughter’s christening ; for the 
baptismal ceremony was performed on the last 
Sunday they were to spend at home — and since 
they came here to this distant mission ground, 
they had never retraced their steps. Through 
sickness, and poverty, and loneliness, the brave 
pair have struggled, and God has helped them, 
so that from year to year they have said, look- 
ing at each other, “ One day this place will be 
a garden of the Lord. He helps us in His 
vineyard.” 

But this house, this very cabin to which I 
welcomed you, was Charley’s birth-place — and 
here, also, little Grace was born and died. 
Her grave, on the edge of the woods near by, 


CHRISTMAS-BOX. 


209 


is a mound of flowers, and her memory is sweet 
and fragrant as any bud that blooms there. 

The cabin is covered with vines, woodbine, 
green the summer through, and glorious in its 
autumn scarlet, — enough to make one think of 
the burning bush, in October ; and if anywhere 
on this earth one could stand expecting to hear 
the voice of God, it might surely be on the 
threshold of Parson Greenfield^s home. 

The Missionary's wife is no longer young. 
Her brown hair has more than one gray thread 
among its locks. She is not as strong as she 
was once, in the flesh ; but sometimes it happens 
that as the flesh grows weak, the soul grows 
powerful. And thus it is with her. Parson 
Greenfield sometimes trembles when he sees 
how frail is the staff on which he leans. A 
brave man is he, but he has not the courage to 
look the fact in the face that by and by he may 
possibly be left alone with his children to do 
his missionary work. That is one of the few 
possible things that can make the good man 
tremble. 

Ask her if she ever regrets having come into 
18 * 


210 


THE MISSIONARY'S 


the wilderness with this laborer to aid him in 
making straight a path for the blessed Lord. 
Oh, ye daughters of ease, you might well blush 
to hear her answer, and to see her answer ; for 
by other ways than speech she will reply. 
Shall she count any hardship too heavy work- 
ing for her Christ ? Is she not crucified to the 
world for his sake ? and the world to her for 
his dear sake ? What if she gave up a pleas- 
ant home, for Him ? He gave up Heaven for 
her ! what if she has known sleepless nights ? 
there’s Gethsemane to set against them! or 
days of toil and care? what are they to in- 
trude on the remembrance of his thirty years 
spent in the work of Redemption I 
Yet, she has known many cares, many priva- 
tions, many sorrows. Those whom the mis- 
sionaries trusted most have served them worst, 
sometimes, have failed them, and deceived them. 
And what a struggle it has been, contriving, 
aye, through more than one dark year, to keep 
soul and body together, when the children, at 
least, at all cost, must be saved from freezing 
and from starvation I What a work to preach 


CHRISTMAS-BOX. 


211 


the Gospel through all provocation, in their 
daily life, as well as in the pulpit ! 

The missionary and his wife had not labored 
in vain. There, on the hill-side in the village, 
stood the pastoral evidence. He had succeeded 
in building up a church. It had been built, it 
almost seemed, just inch by inch. But there it 
stood at last! there, on the summit of the 
slope, their joy, their pride ,* and if Mr. Geeen- 
field and his wife must depart out of this 
world, leaving no other evidence of their long 
work than this, was it not enough to have lived 
and died for, the building of a temple for the 
Lord ? They thought so. 

God knew what precious ornaments they 
would fain have brought into his courts. What 
a bell they would have set swinging in the little 
tower ; how, in place of the. rude benches, they 
would have provided better seats for the con- 
gregation ; but they knew his gracious way 
of accepting the gifts of men — according to 
what a man hath, according to what a man can 
do, the Master expects of him. 

While Mrs. Greenfield was busying herself, 


i 


212 


THE MISSIONARY'S 


bringing preparations for supper towards such 
a state of completion as made her look with 
anxiety for the return of the family, Lizzie 
came running in for linament and bandages for 
the pony's leg. 

With these she hurried away again to the 
shed-like enclosure where the cow and pony 
lodged. 

Presently she came back, all aglow, yet her 
helpful hands were busy about the fireplace be- 
fore she spoke ; at last her mother said, 

“ Well, Lizzie? ” 

“ Papa thinks, after all, it isn’t such a Tery 
bad sprain. But — poor Zip can hardly walk, 
they had almost to carry him. He will have 
to be shot, if the leg is — I mean he would have 
had to be if the leg was regularly broken. . . . 
Charley cried all the way. ... We couldn’t 
help it, though. ... It was a good thing I 
had the lantern. . . . Papa made me come in. 
... I wonder if he thinks I can’t bear as 
much as Charley? Let me make a good 
strong cup of tea for him — ^he’s had such a 
terrible time. . . . It’s getting pretty low, isn’t 


CHRISTMAS-BOX. 


213 


it ? ... A teaspoon for papa, and one for the 
pot, and one for — 

“ Not for me, child. Not to-night. I don’t 
feel the need of it. I’ll need it more 
some other time, perhaps,” said Mrs. Green- 
field. 

“ That’s what you always say — but it’s 
Christmas Eve! why, mamma!” Lizzie carried 
her point by shutting the tea-box and her eyes 
at the same time, as if she would escape the 
vision of emptiness before her. 

“ Poor papa ! ” said the pastor’s wife, “ what 
a blessing, Lizzie, that it didn’t happen further 
up the country — and night coming on ! ” 

“ Mamma, the worst thing never happened to 
you, did it ? ” 

Lizzie, who had come close to her mother as 
she asked this question, clasped her arms 
around her waist, and waited, fully expecting, 
the answer that came. 

“ Never, my child. God always saves us from 
the worst.” 

“Zip slipped in a hole between the logs. 
Papa said he thought he should know the place. 


214 


THE MISSIONARY'S 


but it was so dark, and the snow almost 
blinded him this morning. Zip threw him. It 
was all done in a second. . . . Oh, I wish Joe 
would come home ! Don’t you think he will, 
to-night I It’s Christmas Eve ! ” 

How often she had said that to herself this 
day ! over and over again had said it — Christ- 
mas Eve ! as if the great festival season must 
have some good, if not some joy, in store for 
them also, as well as for all the rest of Chris- 
tendom. 

“ If he doesn’t,” said her mother, “ we must 
try — ” but Mrs. Greenfield could not finish the 
sentence. 

Lizzie understood her mother’s thought, and 
replied hurriedly, “If papa had only gone 
the other way, he might have brought him. 
But I know — it wasn’t to be, of course. We 
could go down, Charley and I could, by the 
river, if there wasn’t so much ice in it. Oh, 
how I do hope Zip will be all right in the morn- 
ing — ^but it would be curious, mamma, if he 
should be — everything goes so contrary with us. 
We have always something to worry about.” 


215 


CHRISTMAS-B 0.x\ 

“ Hush, child,” said her mother, “ you don^t 
know what you are saying. Our right isn’t God’s 
right always. Let us choose what He chooses. 
Let Him rule.” Oftener than Lizzie had said to 
herself “ this is Christmas Eve,” her mother had 
said to herself “ Let Him rule,” but as often as 
she said it how she had also prayed for her ab- 
sent son ! that he might be delivered from temp- 
tations, and from snares, and brought back to 
his father’s house again, a penitent, if he had 
been a prodigal. 

And now there came at last a sound of voices, 
and the stamping of feet outside, and the pastor 
and Charley entered, both of them more cheer- 
ful than we might have expected, but they both 
are hoping the best for the pony. And what 
is it Parson Greenfield is always saying 
“ Let us serve God with a cheerful countenance, 
and a thankful heart. Does He not know us 
altogether ? Is He not our Father ? ” 

Parson Greenfield is somewhere between 
forty and fifty years of age. There are gray 
hairs, plenty of them, on his forehead. Plenty 
of wrinkles too, about his eyes, and how hard 


216 


THE missionary's 


and rough his hands are — ^I iotv very coarse his 
garments, though they are his best ! But oh, 
what a smile is on his lips, when now and then 
it comes out with some gracious word or kindly 
deed ! — it gives his face, I think, the look that 
an angel’s face might have. 

And what is the good man doing here ? You 
all know. Breaking up land where somebody 
shall some day reap great harvests. Cutting 
down forests where by and by the rose shall 
abundantly bloom. Talk to him of money ! 
He is thinking of building churches I Hint at 
hard times, while you hold fast the luxuries you " 
prize? He is thinking of weakness to be clothed, 
of hunger to be fed, of want, such as shall not 
merely leave a man a beggar on this earth — but 
gifall send him palsied and poor into Heaven. 
nis house, be sure, is not made with hands. 
His rest is in the heavens. Oh, the people. 
East, or West, may dole out their dollars to 
this man, but the Lord God has given him a 
mine richer than any of Navada, to work, whose 
^ treasure is all his. 

Weather-beaten, scarred, baffled, poorly clad, 


CHRISTMAS-BOX. 


217 


poorly fed, hungering and thirsting through his 
valiant labor, burdened now with wondering, if 
Zip’s leg is really broken where he shall get 
another pony to aid him’ in his necessary jour- 
neys — having nothing, yet possessing all things 
— poor indeed, yet making many rich, boys and 
girls, you may wonder at, admire, reverence, 
love him, but — don’t i3ity him ! 

He has come home now with a store of the 
very cheerfulness that seems to set all things 
aright, wherever he goes. They have talked 
over his hard, cold ride of the morning, the 
comfort he was able to give to the dying woman 
he was summoned to attend, but how much he 
has left untold, when he ends that story by 
saying tliat he thinks the poor old body will 
begin her New Year in eternity ! 

These words reminded Charley that before 
New Year’s day could come, there must first 
be Christmas, find that this was Christmas 
Eve. So, fixing his bright eyes on his father, 
he wished him a “ Merry Christmas.” 

The word brought sudden tears into Parson 
19 


218 


THE MISSIONARY'S 


Greenfield^s eyes ; perhaps it was to hide them 
that he took Charley up in his arms, and said, 
“ Well, then, we must have the Christmas feast/^ 

So they gathered about the table, and asked 
God to bless his bounty and the New Year to 
them. 

It was not a merry meal ; not like any Christ- 
mas feast, perhaps, that was ever called a feast. 
Why did not Joseph come home? That was 
the question both father and mother were ask- 
ing in -their hearts over and over again, and 
neither of them could find words to express 
their fear about the lad. Neither of them, 
without sharpest pain, could for a moment ad- 
mit the thought that this boy had wearied of 
work and privation ; that he was dissatisfied 
with his home ; that he had gone to “ try 
his fortune” among strangers, careless as to 
the anxiety and grief liis absence should occa- 
sion. 

He was their first-born, their strong staff, 
their beautiful rod ; all the hope, all the expec- 
tation their hearts cherished for the youth, 
what tongue but theirs could tell ? And neither 


CHRISTMAS-BOX. 


219 


could theirs tell it. Thinking of him, their 
hearts not only grew heavy, but sadness came 
over their countenances, and the father and 
mother, looking upon each other, had no need 
to express their inmost hidden thought. But 
the parson still talked on. He was telling 
Charley of some famous Christmas eve he 
could remember, reading, as it were, out of his 
old experiences, a fairy tale to the boy ; for hi^ 
childhood was spent in a city far away, and he 
could not mention any thing connected with 
those happy years but the child’s eyes would 
open with wonder. He was telling a Christ- 
mas tale to Charley, I say, when suddenly there 
came a sound as of the trampling of heavy 
feet outside. They all started to their feet at 
that summons, for they seemed to hear a sum- 
mons before they heard a voice. One hope 
and one fear was in every face. 

“ It’s Joseph ! ” said Joseph’s mother. 

“ It's Joseph'! ” said every one of them. 

They were right. As if, indeed, his mother 
could be wrong at such a time ! 

After a moment, came a loud call for a light. 


220 


THE MISSIONAEY^S 


It was verily Joseph’s voice that called. After 
days of wondering, of watching, and of prayer 
in his behalf, so the lad had come again to give 
his own report. Can you imagine how their 
hearts were beating, and what they were all 
thinking, when Lizzie threw open the door, and 
they looked to see his face for whom they had 
begun to sorrow almost as if they should see 
that face no more 7 

Parson Greenfield took up from the table tlie 
bowl of oil in which the rag wick was burning. 
You understand, this lamp was the best light 
the house afforded ; it was not every evening 
that a lamp was lighted in the minister’s house. 
But this was Christmas Eve! Shielding the 
flame from the draft, he carried the lamp in 
his great strong hand to the door. 

What , spectacle would reveal itself to him 
when he should look into the darkness ? Did 
he fear to meet it ? 

Before anything could be seen, something 
was heard. A loud, hearty laugh from Joseph, 
then the young, giant, panting for breath, 
stepped upon the threshold, covered with 


CHEISTM AS-BOX. 


221 


snow, quite wrapped in a mantle of white, and 
said, 

“ IVe come back, you see, from my travels, 
and brought my baggage with me ; it has cost 
me a precious little bit of trouble, I. can tell 
you. But no matter, here we are ! ” 

“ Joseph, where in the world have you kept 
yourself, these three days?’^ Such was the 
father’s welcome. Now that the lad was back 
again, but one question presented itself to the 
father’s mind, and this was asked with au- 
thority. 

“ Oh, I have been in Clifton, of course ; 
couldn’t get any farther,” answered Joseph , 
but it was very evident that he did not find it 
easy to use this kind of speech — no easier than 
it was for his father to hear it. After a mo- 
ment’s hesitation, he crossed the room to his 
mother, and said, looking with honest confi- 
dence into her dear face, 

“Mamma, have you been looking for me 
long?” 

“Ever since you went away, my son,” she 
answered ; then she kissed him. 

19 * 


222 


THE MISSIONARY'S 


“ Day and night ?” said he, for he knew it 
must be so. 

“ Day and night, Joseph.” 

If, as a prodigal, repenting, he had come, the 
manner in which his mother spoke would have 
broken his heart ; but lie looked, with his clear, 
honest eyes full of love and devotion, upon 
her ; this was no prodigal. 

“ What could you think ?” said he. “ I 
haven’t slept any more than you have, these 
three nights, for wondering. I was afraid ” — 

He paused there a moment, and his father, 
taking up Joseph’s last word, said, 

“ And so were we afraid. Yes, Joseph, I’ll 
ov.m it, my son, your mother and I were afraid.” 

“ Of me, mother ? afraid of me ?” 

“ For you,” said the father ; “ for what were 
you doing ? why did you go away without any 
warning ? How could we know ?” 

Joseph wiped the perspiration from his fore- 
head, for though the night was very cold, his 
labor had been toilsome for the last half hour. 
It had taken him all that time to roll the great 
box that stood now just outside the door in 



Till-: (’ 11 li I ST .M A S liOX. 

Piise 222. 





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CHRISTMAS-BOX. 


223 


the darkness of the snow-storm, from the road 
where the wagoner had left it. 

“ Yon went to Clifton, Joseph said his 
mother, as if to encourage his speech. 

“ I did, mother f the voice of the young fel- 
low trembled as he made this answer. He was 
a brave hunter of wild beasts in the forests ; 
he had endured almost every kind of hardship, 
and faced dangers you would shudder but to 
read of, but he trembled thinking of the fear 
his absence had occasioned his mother. “ I ex- 
pected to get back again that night, said he. 
“ The boatmen sang out to me there was some- 
thing for father down there, and I had no time 
to come back and tell you. I knew the river 
would freeze up, but I thought I should get the 
start of it. Well, I was mistaken, but I found 
the box down there.’^ 

“ The Christmas Box cried Charley, who 
could no longer keep back this shout. 

“ I shouldnT wonder if it was a Christmas 
Box,^^ said Joseph. “ I did the best I could. 
When I found there wasn’t another boat com- 
ing up, I was there, and I couldn’t help myself, 


224 


THE MISSIONARY'S 


only in one way. There was a lumberman 
down there said he’d bring it up for me, if 
I’d help him on his job, and I guess he never 
had a better hand. But I tell you I was wor- 
ried, thinking how surprised you would be, and 
whether everything would go on straight here 
while I was away.” 

How could they ever have doubted that lad ? 

How could they ever have doubted him? 
Lizzie asked herself that question as she looked 
at her brother, and she blushed to think of the 
words she had spoken to Charley, complaining 
of poor Joe, who stood there before them mak- 
ing everything so plain and clear, and himself 
so disturbed with thinking that any one beside 
himself had been troubled by his absence. 

“ Nobody knows how long the boy has been 
fasting,” said Parson Greenfield, breaking the 
silence that followed Joseph’s explanation. It 
was not easy for the good man to speak — it 
would have been impossible for his wife to have 
broken the silence — ^but now she said, “ Sit 
down in your place, my son, we will have your 
supper ready in a moment. Come, Lizzie !” 


CHRISTMAS-BOX. 


225 


They had only a bit of pork and corn bread 
to place before him, but do you not suppose he 
ate of the meal with a better relish than the 
prodigal son could have brought to the feast 
of the fatted calf that had been killed for him ? 

“ And we shall have our Christmas Eve ! 
our merry Christmas, after all said Joseph. 
“ I declare, father, it made me fret to think, 
perhaps I should get here too late for it. I 
had hard work to get the man to carry out his 
bargain about bringing the box.’^ 

“ Oh, the box exclaimed Charley, starting 
up from the corner where he had seated him- 
self with the despairing thought, “ They have 
all forgotten that it’s Christmas Eve. And 
there we have a box in the yard that will get 
snowed out of sight, I guess, by morning !” 

So at length they brought that treasure-house 
into the kitchen. 

You know what kind of box it was. Per- 
haps you even helped to pack it ! 

And the house to which it came, you know. 
Do you think there was need of it there ? 

You know, or you can guess, what sight met 


226 


THE CHRISTMAS-BOX. 


tlie eyes of the family — met the mother^s thank- 
ful eyes — met the father’s vision — how a cloud 
of darkness rolled away from their hearts, and 
relieved them of their fear and anxiety about 
the winter’s cold ; how the eyes of Charley 
shone, looking at the comfortable garments that 
went packed up in the box addressed to the 
Rev. Ehen Greenfield. 

God bless their hands and strengthen their 
hearts, who sent a year of comfort in this 
homely shape, to the far-off log cabin of a home 
missionary ! And may every lad who reads 
this story be able to look into his mother’s eyes 
on Christmas Eve, and every other eve, with 
as little shame and as much loving confidence, 
while rendering an account of deeds and stew- 
ardship, as Joseph Greenfield felt when he came 
back from Clifton. 

And may every girl repent her discontent 
and harsh suspicion of another, as Lizzie re- 
pented ; bringing forth in daily life fruits meet 
for repentance. 



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